In one of my classes today, I noticed my professor had a different hairstyle. This isn’t really remarkable news in and of itself, but some other students pointed it out, and the discussion that followed had me thinking deeply about my relationship with my hair. Some background: this professor is the only black professor I’ve had during my two semesters studying in Germany, and one of only a few black teachers I’ve had over the course of my life. Moving from my overwhelmingly white high school to an overwhelmingly white university to a country that is 91.6 percent European, I haven’t ever been forced to confront race in the same ways as those who live in more diverse communities, or are people of color themselves. But I do try to educate myself in whatever ways I can. I watched “Don’t Cash Crop On My Cornrows,” the viral video created by actress Amandla Stenberg. I watch news videos, read articles, and listen to the occasional podcast. I know there are lots of issues surrounding black hair: in schools, in the military, in everyday life. So when my professor began to talk about her hair, I was keenly interested to hear what she had to say, to perhaps learn a new, individual perspective on black hair.

She explained that she hadn’t cut her hair. She just took out her extensions, and what we were seeing now was how her hair naturally grew. What struck me wasn’t the details of how she styled her hair or how she had worn it in the past; rather, it was how proud she sounded of her hair, how willing she was to defend and explain it, and the deep connection she had to it. Don’t get me wrong-- I too love my hair. I have a deep personal connections to my hair and how I choose to wear and style it. But when I listened to my professor talk about her cultural connections to hair salons and barbershops, her associations with different black hairstyles and her defenses against the reactions of others, I suddenly realized that I will never feel this way about my hair. As deep as my connection to my hair as a part of my self-image is, my hair will never represent me or my culture in such a dramatic and visible way. And that’s okay. My hair is beautiful, my hair makes me feel free, my hair is important to how I view myself and present myself to the world. But my hair is not cultural. It rarely needs a defense. All of this, as I have said, is okay. I think examining our own individual and cultural relationships with hair is not only important, it’s fun! But I also think it’s important for white people like me to realize that our hair will rarely have the same level cultural significance as it does in communities of color. We as white people are mostly drawn to hairstyles because they look cool, or fit some idea of self-image we have, rarely because they have cultural, historical, or personal significance to us. So ponder for a bit longer next time you go to the salon! And if you’re white, please for the love of God stop getting dreadlocks.