“Ion know, but they say my attitude change every time I change my weave.” – City Girls.
That’s how I feel every time I look at myself in the mirror and I have my new hair in. I feel like a different version of me.
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I have loose curls that make me feel more island and tropical, and I wear that when the weather’s nice, or I have my straight hair that I wear in the winter, and I just comb it with my fingers and you can’t tell me anything. Being East African as well, a lot of people can’t really pinpoint where you’re from, so I get lots of different assumptions as to what my ethnicity can be. It’s a mini version of what happened to Adichie with her roommate. My identity isn’t consistent. Every day when I wake up, I choose which layer of me to identify with most, depending on my mood and how I feel.
In “The Danger of a Single Story,” Adichie talks about how a single story is when people reduce someone to one narrative. Her roommate pitied her, was surprised by her English, and assumed she couldn’t use a stove. She also admits she held a single story herself about Fide’s family, who she only saw as poor, until she saw the basket his brother made. Her identity is multi-layered. I picture her as your African auntie one day, and your award-winning, very educated writer another day. It doesn’t mean she can’t be both.
I found hair to be a perfect example, because as a Black woman, changing your hair gives you a certain confidence, and it softens or toughens up your appearance. You could go for something bold and eye-catching, or something so people just don’t look at you. When you look in the mirror you can decide, “I want to wear this hair with this outfit, and I want to give off this vibe,” or I could do something else. The difference is that I’m choosing my many selves. At moments, Adichie and MJ had one self chosen for them, until they took the narrative back. But I can’t control how other people read me. Whether my hair is curly or straight, people still guess at my ethnicity, and Adichie’s point is that whoever has the power decides which story sticks.
In “Namesake,” MJ’s experience of people judging their identity shows how harmful it can be when others decide how you’re allowed to express yourself. For MJ, it wasn’t about being a tomboy and not being a girl or a guy. They were themselves. That is how they wanted to dress, that is how they wanted to carry themselves. It didn’t have to be about gender until people made it about that. MJ didn’t realize they were an “it” until other people defined them that way. MJ’s partner was the one who was pregnant, and MJ chose the name “baba” for their role. Just because they didn’t conform to gender norms doesn’t mean that they can’t be a parent as well. Is parenthood limited to a woman and a man?
I don’t mean to complicate hair, but I probably overcomplicated it on purpose. You could be whoever you want, as long as you’re the one choosing. Making identity a bigger deal than what it is might stress my hair stylist out, because I like to change my identity every day. So the next time I change my hair, I might be a little ruder. Watch out for that. How do you feel when other people decide who you are instead of you?
