{"title":"When things get hairy: afros, cornrows, and the desegregation of US military hair salons in West Germany","authors":"Felicitas R. Jaima","doi":"10.1080/17528631.2017.1363477","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article employs ‘hair’ as a lens for investigating the ways in which black women’s experiences in the US military and West Germany were racialized and, at the same time, gendered. Based on the personal stories of Women’s Army Corps member Babette Peyton, who got court-martialed in Germany in 1975 for wearing her hair in cornrows, and Marie Davenport, teacher and beautician in Frankfurt, who desegregated the local military hair salon, this article uncovers black women’s mundane activism against racial and gender discrimination. Their experiences and perseverance demonstrate that black military women made critical contributions to the Civil Rights Movement while abroad in Germany.","PeriodicalId":39013,"journal":{"name":"African and Black Diaspora","volume":"10 1","pages":"269 - 280"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2017-08-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1080/17528631.2017.1363477","citationCount":"1","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"African and Black Diaspora","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17528631.2017.1363477","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"Social Sciences","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 1
Abstract
ABSTRACT This article employs ‘hair’ as a lens for investigating the ways in which black women’s experiences in the US military and West Germany were racialized and, at the same time, gendered. Based on the personal stories of Women’s Army Corps member Babette Peyton, who got court-martialed in Germany in 1975 for wearing her hair in cornrows, and Marie Davenport, teacher and beautician in Frankfurt, who desegregated the local military hair salon, this article uncovers black women’s mundane activism against racial and gender discrimination. Their experiences and perseverance demonstrate that black military women made critical contributions to the Civil Rights Movement while abroad in Germany.