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Good hair (phrase)


Good hair is a phrase used within the African-American community to generally describe African-American hair (or the hair texture belonging to those of other ethnicities who fit the same description) that most closely resembles the hair of non-Black people (straight or curly), especially those images of hair popularly presented in society, and as contrasted with the appearance of natural Afro-textured hair.

Its usage has such a potent history within the African-American community that Chris Rock created a documentary entitled Good Hair, which made a wider audience more aware of the importance of the term within the Black community. Its circulation within the Black community in North America has an unspecified origin, predating Rock's documentary. Depending on the context, "good hair" can connote and evoke both communal laughter and pain. Therefore, the phrase requires a more nuanced explanation for its complicated usages.

Although many hair stylists or beauticians would define "good hair" to mean "healthy hair", the phrase is rarely used in this manner within informal African-American circles. Instead it is used metaphorically to characterize beauty and acceptance. These standards vary for African-American men and women.

In her 2009 article, "Hairitage: Women Writing Race in Children’s Literature," the literary critic Dianne Johnson notes an early 1900s advertisement:

"Once upon a time there lived a Good Fairy whose daily thoughts were of pretty little boys and girls and of beautiful women and handsome men and of how she might make beautiful those unfortunate ones whom nature had not given long, wavy hair and a smooth, lovely complexion” (Johnson, 338).

This ad was for hair products for black women developed by the highly successful African-American entrepreneur, Madam C.J. Walker. Her advertisement played on the idea that curly hair was something to "be fixed." Johnson contends that more than 100 years later, many African-American women still overvalue straight hair.

Johnson notes that the characteristic (fill in blank), coarse hair of many ethnic Africans had historically been referred to in the United States during historic times as "nappy." As the term originated during the years when African Americans were held as slaves, especially in the South, it retains a negative connotation. Whites associated the natural, coarse hair of Africans with their second-class status as slaves and non-citizens.


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