A couple of weeks ago, I spoke alongside some brilliant humans for a panel at the opening night of the Talking Textures exhibition. Aiming to delve into the hair, beauty, fashion and culture of Southwest Asian and North African (SWANA) regions, it was an incredible evening that provided representation that is so sorely needed, and felt like a balm to the soul.
Having recently begun my curly hair journey (check out my piece on how I’m in the process of decolonising my hair and mind) it was super inspiring and galvanising to be in a room with so many beautiful curly heads, and to bond over our shared experiences (and traumas!)
We had a really interesting conversation on the importance of representation and community in celebrating diverse textures and features, touching on issues such as colonial mindset, self-acceptance, and the need for inclusive beauty standards. I’d love to share a bit of the conversation with you, below. I hope you enjoy it!
Photos by esteshhad quisay
Introducing the panel:
Yasemin Hassan, a hairstylist based in London, and Director and Curator of the Talking Textures exhibition. Bringing her perspective as a hairstylist, she seamlessly blends artistry with advocacy, challenging societal norms and promoting self-expression.
Dania Arafeh, a Palestinian-British curator and founder of 3EIB - a community-led platform and creative agency which spotlights independent fashion brands from the SWANA region.
Katrina Barayi (HairbyTrina), a driving force of London's curly hair revolution, who is reshaping standards in the world of hair, celebrating and enhancing textured hair through education.
And me! Alya Mooro, an Egyptian-born, London-raised writer, producer, and bestselling author of The Greater Freedom, (etccc.) (If you’re here I’m assuming you know me, my bad if I’m wrong :)))
The panel was hosted by the brilliant Dalia Al-Dujaili, the digital Editor of Azeema, founder of The Road to Nowhere, and a freelance journalist who specialises in arts and culture from the SWANA region and its diaspora.
Dalia: To the hairstylists: what motivated you to specialise in curly hair?
Trina: [Starting out], I didn't really see much representation of what I look like, or my hair. We had an afro hair team [at the salon I worked at] and even they didn't really style hair natural. [As a hairdresser,] you mainly learn how to cut and style European hair, and it just didn't really sit well with me. I was like, ‘How can I be a hairdresser and not know how to cut curly hair or Afro hair, which is everywhere?!’
Dalia: Dania, how important is it for you to celebrate the natural features of Arabs with your platform, 3EIB?
Dania: Representation is so important to us. We don't exactly go around seeing billboards of people that look like us, or in magazines, so it's very important to give opportunities to our community. But when I say 'us' and when I talk about 'we', it's important to talk about the diversity that exists within our cultures. Even within curly hair, there's so many different types of curly. We try to give as broad a representation as possible and show our individual looks.
Dalia: That's something that is so key; the diversity of our region. Me and my cousins look completely unrelated, we've got, like, a really white, ginger girl with freckles who looks Scottish, then you've got me, then you've got my other cousin who looks Iranian... we all just look so different but we're from the same family.
Alya, your book, The Greater Freedom, and your writing in general, really explores what it means to be a Middle Eastern woman and broadening those narratives. A big part of that is embracing your natural features, and I know you recently began your own natural hair journey. Tell us about your experience fighting European beauty standards and how you now view your hair.
Alya: I've literally just started my natural hair journey, it's been since January, basically. Growing up, I was very much told, 'mankoosha' - your hair is messy. My earliest memories are of my mum blowdrying my hair. Every Sunday, before school, she'd be blowdrying my hair because - how could I possibly go to school with my hair messy like that?! I've been doing really intense hair straightening treatments, like the Yuko system, the Brazilian blow dry... these kinds of things where your hair can literally fall out. One of the big turning points for me, although it took me much longer to really do anything about it, was when the woman who used to do the Brazilian blow-dry for me got pregnant and said she had to stop because it was too dangerous for her unborn child. I was like… ‘What? Why are we here?’ These kinds of things started to add up.
When I started writing my book, The Greater Freedom, I have a whole chapter called ‘When you learn how you're supposed to look,’ and a whole chunk of that chapter was dedicated to hair. The more research I did into it, the more I was like, ‘We've been brainwashed! Why am I still listening?’ But again, it took me much longer, because I felt messy when I'd look in the mirror. I would not feel like myself, whatever that means.
What's been really interesting, over the last few months [with the genocide being committed in Palestine], just seeing the Western media and all of these Western ideals, and the ideas of Western superiority that have started to feel... ridiculous, to be honest. It applies to so many things, including what we're supposed to look like. It's been Palestine that has been freeing my hair and has been a huge awakening. Now, I look in the mirror like, 'Oh, this is actually what I look like. This is what I'm supposed to look like!' I feel the most myself I've ever been, and also really sad that it took me this long.
Dalia: What I'm hearing from all of you is that hair is actually really deep, it goes so much deeper than just looks. It's about reckoning with colonialism, with race and class… How has community played a part in all of your lives, starting with hair and self acceptance, but also extending beyond that?
Dania: The reason why I built 3EIB was because, growing up, I didn't have a community that I could relate to or identify myself with. A lot of what we're doing is creating a safe space where we can really be ourselves and have open dialogues about ‘what does identity mean?’ Being rooted in our culture, but also evolving and becoming different versions of that. Community is so important. I mean, the reason why we're all here today is because ultimately, we want to be seen and have shared experiences and, in the context of colonialism and all of the insane shit that's happening in the world, we have to be together and come together. The only way to dismantle the systems of oppression is to do it together.
Alya: I always say 'It's easier to be yourself if you can see yourself' and it's so true. To go back to hair in particular, it's been really inspiring to see the the natural hair movement that’s taking hold. It's annoying because it's almost like, ‘Why do we have to wait for other people to give us permission before we can feel comfortable to do something?’ But that's often how it works as humans. We need belonging and we need to feel 'normal', or seen, and that’s the beauty of community; not needing to explain...
Trina: I obviously love the community, and I have many communities. When it comes to curly hair, though, I think there's also a lot of bashing within the community. There can be a false narrative, like, ‘You can be curly, but your curls have to be defined, or it has to be this shape, or it can't be this or it can't be that...’ We don't even realise sometimes all the force of the pressure of, 'now you've got to be this kind of curly, now you can never have a blow-dry...’
A lot of it is about understanding your own texture. If you haven't lived with your hair natural for years, then I get where you might have expectations that, media-wise, have been put on you. We can all be different, we can have a bit of frizz, your curls don’t have to look a certain way…
Dalia: Absolutely. I feel that it's just more about feeling like you're supported, no matter what you do. You shouldn't feel like you owe it to anyone to wear your hair any type of way. The point of the whole natural hair movement is just for us to feel like we can wear our hair curly... Our curls are beautiful! Now I look at my curls in the mirror when I come out of the shower, and I'm like, 'This is magic!' The fact that our hair coils like that, that's magic. It's nice to see us having fun with our curls and just expressing ourselves.
Yasemin, tell us about the inspiration for the Talking Textures project...
Yasemin: When I started hairdressing, I used to wear my hair straight and have hair extensions. Going through this journey while cutting people's hair and hearing that everyone was having the same issues was really interesting. I wanted to put a series together to talk about hair and identity, and showcasing different textures, talking about the derogatory terms we use for hair, whether that's, ‘bed head’, ‘hat hair’, ‘straggly hair’... A lot of it comes from the derogatory terms that my clients were using against their own hair. I saw that they had traumatic experiences - both from hairdressers and from people from their own community - about how their hair should be, and that impacts the relationship they have with their hair today. I wanted to show as much representation as I could, so that people can see that we are all kind of going through the same thing.
Dalia: Dania, do you have any thoughts on what kind of what negativity, if any, you had to deal with when starting a platform like 3EIB?
Dania: It's interesting, actually, because a lot of the negative voices actually came from my family. I think it's this kind of colonial mindset that they've adopted and they haven't unlearned. Saying, ‘its niche,’ and it's not worth pursuing because, you know, we [Arabs] don't rule the world, and they don't imagine a world in which we could.
In the same way, my family are Palestinian and they don't really believe in a Free Palestine in their lifetime - or in my lifetime. I have a lot of faith in our generation, the young generation, because I think we have the privilege of being a little bit further away from the trauma and the pain that our ancestors went through. And it's our responsibility, really, to push through that and to change the culture - and to change us.
Dalia: Thank you to this amazing panel, and thank you to the audience - for the joy but also for the anger and the uncomfortable feelings, too, because like we said, for all this talk about diversity and inclusivity, we still have a long way to go, and we still have a lot of challenges to fight.
My last thing is, can you each just give me a quick tip for curly hair care. As anyone with curly hair will know, it takes so long to understand your curls. I think a lot of it is about self acceptance, but also actually having the tools because, when you're growing up, especially in a Western country, you're not taught. I had never used a diffuser, for example, until I was 21. I got given one and I was like 'omg this is amazing!' That's my one piece of advice, by the way - use a diffuser.
Yasemin: Learn about your hair, take the time for it. A lot of people say 'I just haven't got time to do my hair,' and I think the most important thing, especially if you're trying to go into wearing your hair more curly is that you have take some time on it.
Trina: Wash day is really important. A lot of us expect a lot from our hair and don't think we have to show up for it, but if you show up on wash day the same way that when you were blowdrying it, you'd spend that hour, or whatever you were doing... that's when you get the longevity. And keep to that wash day. If you've been given a certain product that's working, keep on using it and just keep on showing up, and it should get easier.
Alya: That's been my big learning as well. I think there's this assumption that I used to have which was just like, 'Am I not just washing my hair and that's the end of it?' No. You definitely need to do a couple of things. But also, it's not actually that long. My biggest learning is just be a bit patient and be a bit curious. And don't expect your hair to look the same every single time. That's almost the fun of it. It's not predictable, it's unruly - just like we should all be.
-Alya xo
Please share your thoughts and experiences on natural hair (or not!) and any tips you may have in the comments, or press ‘reply’ to write to me directly.