'Hair tangled with politics: Michelle Obama's tale of strategic resistance and accommodation'

Abstract

[eng] Hair is an essential element in Black women’s socialization. Too frequently, featuring natural hair undermines Black women’s possibilities of occupying high-paying professions. The result has been the naturalization of weaves and relaxers, while natural hair stands of a symbol of revolution, a reason for being marginalized or not taken seriously. In this context, Butler’s theory of performative femininity is linked to urban spaces, for relaxing one’s hair is read as a way of performing the urban and assimilating into mainstream urban social patterns of style and behaviour. This paper explores Michelle Obama’s hairstyling decisions becoming literally political in a context in which she is collectively imagined as an embodiment of aspirational Black urban femininity. The focus is on representations of M. Obama’s hair, and of her embodying Black womanhood. I analyse Obama being granted political influence and her burden of representing and performing Black urban femininity. The analysis is based on fashion magazine articles discussing M. Obama’s hairstyles. Such articles underline the idea that the Obamas would not be politically trusted if M. Obama featured natural hairstyles. Hence, relaxed hair is read as a performative strategy fulfiling social expectations and contributing to achieve political goals as the US First Lady.