I've been a fan of
Autumn Whitefield-Madrano, and her blog,
The Beheld, where concepts of beauty are examined in myriad ways, for quite some time now. So when she asked me if I would be interested in writing a piece on the word
nappy, for her
Thoughts on a Word series, I needed to stop, and breeaaaathe before answering, so as to form proper sentences. ("Wait-what?! Stop it right now! Are you kidding me?! Yes! Yes! Yeessss!", wouldn't do.)
Well, the piece went live today (!!!) and it goes a little something like this:
"Nappy is, at the very least, to be handled with caution. It may mean diaper in some parts of the world, but that’s not the case at all, in these our United States of America. Here, nappy
is combustible. Not everyone can say it and come away unscathed. Say it
to, or even just near, the wrong person and it might just blow up in
your face. In 2007, shock jock Don Imus found that out, and reminded us all about it, when he called the Rutgers University women’s basketball team “some nappy-headed hoes.”
The firestorm that ensued left him jobless in its wake. At the time,
Lanita Jacobs-Huey, an associate professor of anthropology and American
studies and ethnicity at the University of Southern California,
expressed a view common among many African-Americans when she said, “When I hear it from someone who doesn’t understand the depth of pain, they just don’t have the right to say it.” See, nappy
is a huge snag in the idea that we live in a post-racial society,
because in large parts of the African-American community, nappy is a
deep, deep wound rooted in slavery and Jim Crow" (...continue reading at The Beheld)
There's nothing quite like writing that inspires, and there's plenty of that at
The Beheld, so I'm honored to see my work on the site, and doing inner cartwheels as a result. If you have yet to check it out, do yourself the favor of
running clicking over there right now. Also, see The Beheld syndicated on
The New Inquiry. Comment, share, follow, like (if you do), tell a friend, and do let me know what you think...
