Important read... Complex Curls: Issues of Race and Curly Hair

This is an unpublished piece presented at the 2009 annual meeting of the American Sociological Association in San Francisco by author Ja'Nean Palacios of San Jose State University.  

Her paper does a fantastic job of linking our perceptions of race with those of curly hair, analyzing how women and men of various cultural backgrounds connect with their own curls. 

I am hoping to locate Palacios' master's thesis which deals with the experience of having curly hair.  If I locate it, I will post the information here.

The link below is to the paper's abstract.  Scroll down the page to "Get This Document" for two links to a PDF file:

http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/1/0/8/9/5/p108957_index.html

Another read: "Naturally Curly"

A short piece by Anita Garner on the curly women in her family:

http://theagingofaquarius.com/ag_blog/?tag=politics-of-hair

Article: "Hair Raising"

Thought-provoking short piece by Michon Boston on the subject of hair, texture, culture and politics...

Mini-exerpt:

I’m listening to NPR this morning. There’s a story about hair…actually shampoo. Breaking news - “We” don’t have to shampoo our hair every day.” Who is the “we”? Who is the “us”? Who are the “Americans” all of us - the ones who shampoo daily?


http://www.eclectique916.com/2009/03/19/hair-raising/