Shaping the Future Shaping the Future digital FINAL X | Page 14

AROA
CULTURE
Style
Black hair is essential to the everlasting style of the culture. African
Americans are key to the fashion industry. The culture has produced
legends such as Tyra Banks and Naomi Campbell, both who has made bold
statements with their outfits and design choices. Black style has been a
form of expression for generations, even in the times before magazines
and fashion shows. Women would braid maps onto the scalps of their
daughters in order to remember escape routes. Protestors wore their hair
in fros, covered themselves in black leather, and wore one glove to rip the
sheet of segregation off of their communities. It has always been more
than just clothes or a hairstyle. They represent freedom, suffering, and the
long worked for integrity and dignity. This is why when celebrities who were
not born into the lineage of this unique culture, African Americans take
For The
Culture
Our Forever 44 walked, talked, and dressed differently from all of
the rest. Why? He has an innate sense of self that all black people
are born with. The confidence and rhythm runs through our veins
and make hearts pound. It is what makes us intimidating. Oh the
beauty of credence and conviction. Our drip is different from
the rest. In the famous words of Solange Knowles, it is “for us, by
us.” Black culture itself has lent not just its hands, but its entire
existence to the world. You can travel to the furthest corners of
the earth and still manage to find something that Black people
have either created or have influenced in a major way.
Our Hair
As you read this, there are little brown girls in South Africa being
forced to bathe their hair in white chemicals in order to read. If
they do not cover the hair that grows from their scalps naturally,
then they cannot enter their schoolhouses. These girls are
revolting. They are unraveling their hijabs, cut-ting their fried locs,
and letting their curls twist and wind. They are screaming without
using words. Here in America, black people undergo the same
stylistic oppression that hinders our growth. Dreads, fros, and
braids are not the trend for job interviews, yet it is what we are
born with. Before, blacks were complicit with the Europeanized
societal standards. Boxes of perms sat in the cabinets of most
black girls’ bathrooms. Dreads didn’t fall from the heads of our
brothers. Our hair lost its voice. Now, it has regained its chords
and is yelling from the top of its roots to the tips of its ends.
of-fense. Many people only observe the surface-level of the outfits. It is
okay to appreciate, but it is disrespectful to appropriate—any culture at
any time.
Skin Complexion
In more recent times, darker skin is being more appreciated and accepted
within the black community and many others. Beginning at a young age,
chocolate girls have been told that they cannot wear certain colors and
have had a difficult time finding makeup shades to compliment their natu-
ral beauty. Now, they are releasing their inhibitions and becoming bolder
with every passing day. All of the hues that they have been restricted from
wearing are showing up on brown girls across the world. With the help of
Rihanna and a few other makeup brands, black girls are now able to express
their artistic skills through cosmetics that are made specifically for them.
The monumental release of makeup lines, like Fenty, sparked a beautiful
uproar of gratefulness and appreciation within the black community. The
creation of these cosmetics was a way to communicate to other lines that
brown girls have been neglected for too long and now is the time to even
out the tables.
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