Black Women's Beauty and Elegance Stands in its own Light - Refused to be eliminated or hidden

Black women's beauty and elegance  stands in its own light because it refused to be eliminated or hidden. There’s a certain magic in the way mature Black women exude beauty. It’s not simply the visible aspects—our features are stunning— and there is a depth that comes with the years lived, the stories experienced, and the wisdom gained. Their elegance is woven into every facet of their being, creating a presence that is felt before it’s even acknowledged. Black women's true beauty exudes from the fact that we refused to be defined by an outer world that says our curly hair is not good enough and should be hidden under a wig, or that our melanated skin is not accepted by society as true beauty. But, here stands a beauty that withstood weeks and months in the belly of slave ships where there was no access to a comb or oils to grease the scalp. This beauty withstood the statements about the size of our lips and our hips. This majestic beauty lounges in the beautiful soft chair and just observes the audience even the audience of the rich and affluent who trades our hair for euro-centric wigs or those made from asian hair. It stand firm with a knowing that even when hidden, our beauty cannot and will never be eliminated. 

Transcript

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Welcome to the elegance and beauty of mature black women. In today's video, I will be discussing the reasons, the why, why do we see it important to journal the about the elegance and the beauty of mature black women? Well, I'll step straight into it and welcome you to our site, our video, our channel. And as a mature black woman, we say, well, what is a mature black woman? Well, in this video, I'm saying black women from late 40s into our 50s, going right up into our senior years. I feel compelled to discuss and journal about our beauty, our history, and what makes us beautiful. And so I believe that the beauty of black women as we enter a certain age group comes through our experience. It comes through our life. We have been very young, we've had social terminologies used about our beauties, assumptions about our beauty, and about how we feel about our beauty. And as black women, as we come through our journey in different age groups, we've learned how to use colour, we've learned how to dress, we've learned what fits us, we've learned how we will be or not be defined by the general public or the wider media about what is they deem to be beautiful. So I'm just gonna go a little bit into that. So as a black woman, when we come into that mature life span or life stage, often we've been, some of us have been mothers, some of us are at the point that we're being grandmothers, some of us have seen life storms, some of us have experienced life calms, some of us have experienced such an array of things which has given us a different type of confidence. And perhaps you'd say, Well, no, my my life hasn't given me anything for me to be confident about. Because beauty is often defined as what we look like outside, where I really truly believe that real beauty is a combination of how we present ourselves, what we look like outside, but true beauty comes from how we identify ourselves and how we see ourselves and how we speak to ourselves. So for us, a black woman, this is my perspective, I'd like to hear other people's view as well. Our beauty comes from the melanin in our skin that adds to our beauty. We're shades of golden to shades of lighter to shades of deep ebony, and all of that contributes to our beauty. Our beauty is also in our hair, our beauty is also our facial features, and I would like to add to that, and I've not heard it spoken to like that. I would say, this is my feeling as a black woman, a mature black woman, that our beauty has been weaponized against us, our beauty has been politicized also, and our beauty has been used as ways to divide us, and yet our beauty is there to for us to embrace each other. So by society's standards, or some society standards, the the melanin in our skin is not acceptable, unless it's a certain shade, and so I think it's up to us as black women, whatever shade of melanin we have, to stand proud in that and not be divided by it. The other things that society will sometimes say is the shape of our bodies. I would say embrace our bodies. Our bodies is beautiful, our body form is beautiful, it's our body, it's our shape, it's what makes us that's how we're born. Our body is shaped and how we walk, as black women, we walk with a certain elegance and the sway and the softness and the role of our hips and the way in which we hold ourselves and command ourselves. And we say, well, how so? Well, I'll say that as a child, as a young child, I remembered um because I lived in a village, um, I remembered the the women um wrapping um like a straw like round, they call it a cutter, and they'd put it on their head, and then they would put on the top of the head the the container in which they would carry water from the well to the house. And I remembered that sway, that swing of the body, that that confidence. And some women would walk fast and some women would walk slow, but they would still hold their head high, they would have their back straight, and they'd walk with a sort of uh elegance. So I'd say to uh black women that is our inherent part of our beauty and our elegance, that is the elegance of who we are. And one of the biggest things for us as black women, um in mature life, I would hope that we'd be able to say is to um support and facilitate the the girls in our communities and the young women to respect the hair that grows from our scalp. The most politicized part of black women's beauty, I believe, has been our hair, and how the coily hair that grows from our scalp has been under attack for so many centuries for us to conform to Eurocentric idea of what beautiful hair should be, and so more than any time before in history, I believe our the the beauty of us black women has been under attack and has also the the the the depth of the attack is such that it's taught us, some of us, from early childhood um to be ashamed of our hair. And in this last 20th, 21st, 20th, 21st century, there's been no harsher attack on the black woman's beauty, the part which is our crown. You know, that the crown in glory of us as black women begins from the crown of our head to the sole of our feet. But the to begin the attack at the crown is very important because the crown is where we have the sense of identity and strength. So if you pull from that, it's such a big part of our identity, which is demonstrated in Hollywood stars, um, you know, influencers, as many black women as they get, as many black women, all black women, as they get um rich, affluent in society, one of the first things to do is to buy a row of wigs to put on and cover that part, you know, the part that we should we're we've been taught or internalized, which would we should be ashamed of. We shouldn't be seen in public. Um, I remembered um when I used to go to the barber because sometimes I have a barber shop cut, and the barber said to me, Oh, it's interesting that you would wear your hair like this. And I said, Interesting? My hair that grows from my scalp? He said, Well, most young black women that come in here that they would not even dream of leaving out of the shop with a natural hair on their head, like you do. You come in with it and you go out with it. I said, well, why? Or they have to have a wig. Or they call the wig girls, or they call it protective protective styling. But I I want us to take us back right, go right back to when we were taken onto the slave ships, and we were put down as low as possible. And our hair could not be combed and was tangled. Yet our features stood out, our beauty, the depth and the depth of our skin, the depth of the ebony, the depth of all the colour that we are. And yet the minute we were found a place, a haven, as it were, a safe place within the you know the colonized areas, one of the first things that we did is found ways to comb that hair. We found things that would make moisture in that scalp. So from then, from even then, from in the slave ships, our the crown on our head, our crown in glory was being under attack. But now we're in the 21st century, there's a subtlety. Which is we m we have to make it as near to European hair as we possibly can. And the higher up you are in Hollywood and all those places, it's easy to um accept that diminishing of us because you there's a sense that you're closer to what is acceptable, and one of the one is one thing that's not acceptable about us as black women is our hair, the depth of the menolin in our skin and our hair. So as the our hair is under attack, and we accept that the coiliness of our hair, the springiness of the hair, we ourselves as black women, we begin to speak about our hair, about our hair being difficult, hard to manage. And we tell these stories about our hair because it it helps us as we diminish it, and by the wigs, and by anything that is can be added to it, which looks European. But what I would say is, and the higher ranking star there is, the likeliness that the our Afro hair is even even more. There's so much shame around it. But what I would wanted to say is there is a school or a body of black women in the world, and we accept our hair. We accept the beauty, we accept our lips uh fuller, we accept the shape of our nose, we accept that the that God, the creator, created the soft, spongy coiliness of our hair as it protect us, protect the scalp. And it is beautiful. The psalmist David said, Behold, I am fearfully and I'm marvelously made. I believe that I'm fearfully and marvelously made. And it does not begin from my eyebrows and go down, it begins here at the crown. The crown at the head, the mind, we're all of our area, as we begin to internalize these ideas that our hair is ugly, our features are ugly, if they're not light enough, they should be darkened. That is the history of black women's beauty, and there's a good school of us, and we're standing and we're saying, thus far and no further. Because if you look back, and I look back into my hair, or my memory of hair, is that the hair for black women, it unites us, it's unity. I remember as a child in the community, um, it's your grandmother that would plait your hair. Or you'd be in the West Indies, you'd be in the what they call the yard. You'd be in the yard, and the woman or the grandmother or the cousin or the other person plaiting your hair would be sat on a stool or a piece of wood that makes it look a stool, and you'd be sat on the floor. They'd have the the air oil, the the grease, the something to soften your scalp on one thing, and they'd put a bit on their hand, and they would begin to comb your hair softly, gently, and they would part the hair, and they would put oil into the scalp, and they would plait each hair in in squares, and as they plaited they hummed and they sang. And they'd plait your hair and they'd rock. Or they'd sing and there'd be food nearby, and Miss Elza would come along, and she maybe stop to have a talk, and then now and again they say, Picnic, keep your head still, keep your head still, and you yeah, you'd look up, and then you'd be finished, and there's a sense of community, and we go back to my story. My mum had four girl children, so she'd be, you know, the hair wash day, the the the the air roll that she used, the basic oil, and then she'd part and she'd plat. She'd start with the youngest, and I'd help her with the youngest, because the youngest child had very, very short hair, and I could help my mom to really help her to plait it. And then she'd move to the oldest child. And in my case, I got to about 11 or 12, and I didn't want my hair plaited anymore. I just wanted it left short. And my mom said, Okay, I'm not chasing you around. If you don't want your hair plaited, that's okay. And I wore my hair short till I was about 17, 18. Just like short, like a little boy's car, like a little afro. But I remembered my mother saying to me when I was about 18, she said, your hair is your crown in glory. So my mom didn't send to me there's a shame about my hair or any part of my feature. So I know always used to say you've got a Colgate smile, this wide, pretty white smile. So the the stories that you tell your children, and our hair is part of our storytelling, it's very important. Our hair is part of our storytelling. So now we have a different scenario now. So what I remembered in school, um, because we were in England and we were, of course, from the Caribbean, from Jamaica, and sometimes in school the children would call us names. Uh oh, you're black bees, you're black bees, or go home and say to mom, what the children keep calling us black bastards. What is that? And my mum said, Oh, she said, Well, you need to tell the children um that you're you're you're black, yeah, that you're you're black, you're identified as black, but you're not a bastard. So just let them know that. So I'd go back to school, I'd say, oh, they say, oh, Shirley, you're you're you're a black bastard, and I'd say, Oh, my mom said that I'm black, but I'm not bastard. Uh, because she was married when she had me. Because in those days in the 60s and 70s, to call a child that those names was seen as a terrible thing. Where it's terrible now, but in those days it was seen as terrible, especially for black women. If you you your children went to school and they were called those things, there was an indictment against your mother's character in those days is what it would be seen like. It's not seen the same way now. But I remembered, you know, when we went back home, you know, it was really important for our mother to affirm us in ourselves. And our hair was plaited tight, and the oil would glisten on our scalp. And we sometimes some of us had ribbons, but I had short hair, but my sisters would have ribbons and plaits. But so, but my my mother didn't wear a wig. My mother had her own hair, which she also plaited or wounded and put a hairnet on it. So for me, as a girl child, I didn't have those type of issues. But now what we have with the attack on the black woman's uh persona, which some people call us difficult. Um, some people, and yes, we're the some of the kindest people on the face of God's earth, and also our lips, when we're children, were our lips was called all sorts of names, we'd be here all day with the lists as it went on. But and our hair, not so much attacked on her hair. But my mum was very good about saying, your hair is your crowning glory. It's your crowning glory, your hair is your part of your beauty. But now we have a different scenario now where the black girl child in school is measured that her hair isn't good enough, and the beautiful plaids that her mother puts her in her hair in the morning, and the one. Wonderful multicolored pastel and all different colours of baubles is not pretty. It's ugly. And then when she meets her mother from school, her mother's hair is after all hair is covered with a wig. So the paradox for that child is what can we say in a child's eyes, in a child's mind, while the other children think she's not she's not she's not good enough, she's not beautiful, uh she's ugly, her hair is ugly. Well you might be pretty like a pop star, but your hair is ugly. No one shows that hair anymore. So that child when she she you should think to herself, oh her mother's hair is covered with a wig or hidden. Because part of the the thing about black women's beauty is that uh for society it must be hidden because it's enough, it's not enough. So that the paradox of that child then is hmm well my mother hides her hair. Well, as soon as I get old enough, I want this hidden, I want it securely underneath a wig as soon as possible. Because it's it's not beautiful, and so the attack on a black woman, on our hair, on our features, and and and some of us have internalized that, and that this is a caution. So if you're watching, you might have some strong views about it yourself, but mine is a perspective, and I'm because I'm journaling the beauty and elegance of black women, mature black women, it's without uh a doubt, I also have to go back into my childhood where I learned about my beauty, the idea of my beauty came from, and I think it's really important to look at that child in the playground or in the you know at recess who's looking on, thinking the hair that is seen as beautiful is has to be your European or European-like or Asian. It's certainly not mine. And mine has to be hidden as soon as possible. As soon as I get the chance, it has to be hidden, put away under a wig or underneath the girls, as sometimes people call them, they're girls. So it's really important to document this part of history, this attack. But it's also important to also say that there is a there's a body of black women across the world. We are securing ourselves, and we have daughters, and we like my mother, we pass on to them that the the crowning glory is there. And the other thing is we may braid our hair in extensions, and we we beautify our hair with with jewelry in our hair, and when we reflect as I reflect on it, I think we have that time where our head, our hair is anointed with oil, as our um mothers or our grandma or our cousins or aunties plat. And it reminds me of the scripture where in the psalm it says, You anoint my head with oil, my cup run it over. So, as black women, let us not fail to spend some time anointing. That anointing is symbolic. Anointing our head with oil is part of the whole idea of massaging our heads, making us feel comfortable, getting our love, getting our one-to-one. Sitting down and platting our children's hair is that one-to-one. It's that one-to-one. You can't plait two heads at one time. Your focus is on one head of hair at one time, so that child gets at one-to-one, and then we we we pat it down, and we may put ribbons in, we may put tiny baubles, and that we have a certain type of elegance that no other women on the face of God's earth have. Because we are mother, we're mother earth, and uh let's not make excuses, let's not tie into things that diminishes our beauty. So, this journaling of of black women's beauty, this week we've this video we've talked about our history, what may attack our beauty. And the one of the biggest things in this channel will be is about the melanated skin. I mean, I love makeup, of course I love makeup, but my use of makeup is not to diminish or hide the melanin, it's to enhance it. Show it in its best capacity, show it in its fullness, whatever colour of melanin that that we have. My mother's a deeper melanin than my melanin. It's it exudes beauty from us, it adds to our grace. So, for me, uh one of the biggest things for me, for my beauty, and I'm casting no judgment on other people, but one of the biggest things for me with my beauty is to make sure that at any opportunity I have I purchase beauty products from black-owned beauty, um people, people who are the similar to me, ethnicity, and women of colour, men of colour, so that that's the first place I go for my beauty, like Fenty Beauty, is my my moisturizers, Juvious place for my foundations. I know skin care for my my daily skincare, and so this is the introductory, really. I've got put out lots of other videos, but this is the real heart of what the elegance and beauty and journaling is all about. It's a start of telling our stories and sharing knowledge about beauty products, and the things which happen to our skin when we get older, um, which often we don't share, which I think is really important to share with other black women. And some of these things are challenges, but some of them are not, um, because like I don't have loads of um wrinkles on my skin. I just don't. I might have a line there and a line on the other side over time, but I don't have loads of lines, and the other thing is I these are extensions in my hair, but I don't have loads of grey in my hair. So I know grey hair brings something else, you know, like make the scalp itch more. Um there's so many things to discuss about black women as we mature, our elegance, but I feel like this video is really talking about the attacks on us by society, and how many of us we own our beauty, we exude beauty and elegance and confidence in all that God has created, and we make no apology for our hair, we make no apology for the colour of our skin, we make no apology for the structure of our nose, we make no apology for the fullness of our lips, we make no apology for the the shape of our hips and the way that we walk. And I'm excited to keep on coming um and sharing for my heart, for my soul, as we journal. And if you have any ideas that you think would be worthy to discuss in this journaling processing process, and please jump in and say, And some weeks I'll demonstrate the makeup and how I use the makeup, um, and how things change on our faces and how we address that ethically and in ways that is not going to harm us or take away from who we are, and this is so exciting, and I've covered quite a lot of ground on this video, and I'm you know looking to see if there's anything else that I have not covered yet. I've discovered, yeah, I've talked about the political politicalness, the politics of our beauty, the challenges, the internalization, the diminishing, but also balance that with the absolute confidence that we have. We're powerful women, you know, we're all queens, um, and in our own right. And wherever you are on your journey, don't be ashamed, jump right in. But I know that the way that I've been brought up, the way that I was raised, the way we were treated when we were children, means that there's nothing about me in particular that would make me want to not own my blackness and my beauty, or make me cover my head with shame, shame of my Afro hair, shame of what God has given to me, and as I get stronger and stronger and more and more affluent and walk in affluent circles because I've I have done for many years, that the power is that I'm equal. I am equal to anyone in that room, and I don't cover my hair and I don't diminish anything about me to make people feel better about themselves. I feel very strong, I feel very powerful in those rooms, and I stand with all, and my hair on my head that God put on my scalp is worthy to be in any room, any place, as in the as in the melanin of my skin. And this is the the the the the lesson that we're sending out more and more to young black women to embrace and for your children, encourage your children to embrace who they are. That beauty is so phenomenally important and so right, they don't need to diminish any part of them, especially when it starts at the crown. Thank you for watching and see you next time!