The Politics of Hair

Abstract

Throughout the history of humankind, women's hair has been fashioned to exhibit beauty, removed to cause humiliation, and interpreted as a sign of strength, power (often destructive), or powerlessness. Because hair continually replenishes itself, it has been imbued with magical, symbolic power and defined by myth and tradition. Stories of Samson and Delilah, Medusa, and Rapunzel are only three of many biblical, mythological, and fairy tales associated with hair. They help to shape our psyche, embedded as they are in our memories from childhood. Hair also has social implications. It helps us determine age, economic, intellectual, and marital status, as well as religious affiliations. Hairstyles can signify conformity, for example, to army regulations, monastic celibacy, or any group-determined aesthetic. Hairstyles can also signify rebellion. Today many women choose to shave their heads as a sign of female bonding and sometimes as a form of protest against the beauty myth. Whether they go bald for personal or political reasons, bald-headed women are often perceived as threatening, perhaps because of the negative connotations associated with baldness as a sign of age, punishment, illness, or rebellion. Prisoners of war were often shorn of their hair, and, after World War II, shearing was used as a form of punishment for French women suspected of collaborating with the enemy. Sometimes hair was also removed from the heads of slaves as a sign of servitude, a tradition that dates back at least to ancient Egypt. In the Old and New Kingdom, children's heads were shaved, except for one remaining lock of hair. When they reached maturity, women's hair was closely cropped and covered with a wig. Some orthodox religions mandate the covering of a woman's hair after marriage. Jewish women at one time were required to cut their hair off and wear a wig. Orthodox women today need not crop their hair but must cover it, usually with a wig, when in public. A sense of modesty also requires an orthodox