Alabama.

I spent a large part of my childhood in Alabama. I've lived and visited many southern states, but Alabama definitely has a culture all its own. My mom is white, my dad black. I experienced life in a predominantly white community and in a predominantly black community. I truly believe that racial themes run through almost every interaction I've had. Maybe I'm just sensitive to it... but none the less.



Anyway, I stopped chemically straightening my hair about 3 years ago, something that was started by my mother when I was 4 or 5, and is a prevalent practice among black women. Not straightening my hair has lead me to really examine and take notice of beauty ideals in the black community and how those standards are prevailed upon by American culture as a whole. I find myself a little disturbed at what beliefs continue to be held, beliefs that I once took for granted and absorbed as my own.

A couple of observations from my last trip to AL:

-A lady sits in the shade, and casually asks her daughter has she been in the sun, commenting that her skin has darkened. From her tone, it is clear that the effect is undesirable.



-A small group of teenage boys- sons, grandsons, cousins, and nephews to black older women sitting under trees within listening distance, unaminosly agree that white girls are preferable to any other. The women make no reaction to what they hear.

This sounds both familiar and strange to me, and leaves me deeply perplexed.