African American Fashion as Symbolic Politics

• In Event: Subversive Habits: Resistance and Democratic Challenges

Abstract

I will explore African American style as a form of symbolic politics, attending to the psychology of style, the ambiguity of hair straightening, and the difference between fashion as a political statement and “mere” fashion. I begin by establishing a context for the study of Black fashion, which is my interest in the efficacy of symbolic politics. I then try to tease out political dimensions of African American style, fashion, and hair, looking at Black fashion as a type of symbolic action; in the second part of the paper I concentrate on one debate about the political meaning of hair straightening. The history of racism and the struggle against it have played out in the symbolic world of hair and dress. Black style has political significance because racial appearance is an important component of racism; denigration of Black features has helped to perpetuate racial inequality, partly by undermining Black self-confidence, which has sometimes led to political passivity.
Nevertheless, many African Americans have employed style and appearance as modes of resistance. Malcolm X for one made the connection between pride and action, arguing in his autobiography that Black people must forsake white beauty ideals and implied that this would be an important step toward radical political action. To resist denigration by the dominant white culture many African Americans have used style to build confidence, push back against racial stereotyping and hegemonic standards of beauty.

Dress and appearance have been constituent elements of the movement for racial equality. The civil rights movement fought against violence, inequality, and hunger, and in that movement dress and appearance mattered. Black fashion can display dignity and resistance by creating new positive images or disruptive images. Overcoming racism required Black people to forge new and positive images for themselves. Embracing Black beauty is healthy and offers psychological relief to the individual, but feelings of solidarity and pride are also necessary collective preparations for action. Blacks must no longer internalize white racism, says hooks. “Unless we transform images of Blackness, of Black people, our ways of looking and our ways of being seen, we cannot make radical interventions that will fundamentally alter our situation.” According to Shane White and Graham White, there have been at least two prominent forms of style resistance: elegance and bricolage. Dressing elegantly disrupts a stereotype of Blacks as unkempt. Bricolage disrupts a tendency for whites either to not see Black people altogether or believe them to be docile.

Hair straightening is a particularly contested area. Some commentators have interpreted it as accommodation to white standards of male and female beauty, while others, argue that hair straightening has been a form of self-respect or racial and class solidarity. In the early 1960s it seemed that someone who sported an Afro identified with Black militancy or Black power. But a short time later, wearing a “natural” was just a popular look that did not reveal anything about the beliefs of the person who adopted it.

At the center of the debate is the charismatic and often sympathetic figure of Malcolm X. In his 1965 autobiography Malcolm X looked back at his “conk,” or greased and straightened hair, and took it to be reflection of a self-hating slave mentality. He believed that acceptance of natural hair was an important step toward racial pride, and racial pride was a necessary step toward political action. People who feel worthless and blame themselves for their own condition will not fight for their own freedom. Robin Kelley believes that Malcolm misinterpreted his decision to straighten his hair. Kelley and Kobena Mercer see Malcolm’s conk as a sign of working-class solidarity.

In my paper I will describe how several cultural theorists have discussed the meaning and efficacy of African American fashion symbols in political action. After defining the terms symbolic action, politics, and fashion, I will the discussion more specific by studying the political uses of fashion made by some African Americans. I will point out the ways in which African American style has been a form of action: elegance and bricolage. I will focus on one particular debate among African American theorists: is hair straightening an expression of dignity or subservience. My hypothesis is that African American fashion symbols intersect with political action. While fashion symbols are a necessary and often powerful component of political action, their use is unreliable.

Author

• Joshua I. Miller, Lafayette College