The Other Culture Clash

African Braiders vs. African-American Braiders

In Culture Clash, Part 2, the problems of African Braid Shops needing to obtain state license was discussed. there is another part of the other culture clash…the one existing between African braiders and African American braid shops

Haireality has not been in an African Braid Shop in many years. But all the old information on these shops is still pertinent.

Reviews of these shops by customers are the same…these shops are not clean. The same combs and implements are used on many people, the facilities are awful, and the Africans are blunt and rude. Some of this is cultural, other things are due to the lack of standards, ie…licensing.

Many people like the quality of the work so much that they “put up with” the other things. Remember, the customer receiving services such as microbraids, will be there for hours.

African braiders have a unique ability to braid very tightly, so tightly that the customer could lose hair from the follicle because of the tension from the braid.

Many African-American braiders in shops are licensed and went to Beauty School. There is much competition for the dollars going on in the braiding community, and sometimes the two cultures clash, as they try to steer business away from each other. Amazon Smiley owns one of the largest African American braiding shops in Chicago, specializing in locks, twists, extensions, in addition to braids.

Smiley was involved in the founding of the International Braiders Network, a trade association that met every year in a different city until it folded in 1998. She thinks the group had 1,000 members at its height.

There were no Africans involved in this organization.
In a quote from The Chicago Reader:
“It wasn’t an African braiders organization, it was an African-American braiders association. It was our recognition that we know how to braid,” she says, echoing something Taalib-Al Unquib said. “I didn’t appreciate the signs that I saw Senegalese braiders hanging on their shops when they started coming over here–authentic African hair braiding,” he said. “As if what we’d been doing was fake?”

Exactly…what’s authentic.? There is room for everyone in the hair business. Those involved in it don’t always know that.

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