Conk
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The conk was a
History
Conks were often styled as large
Many of the popular
The conk trend and style fell out of popularity when the
Examples of the Natural, short cropped 2 to 4 inches from the scalp or cut very close to the scalp, can be seen in pre-1969 photos of Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye. The Natural was considered a "business man's" hairstyle and was generally accepted by businesses and schools. It was not as subversive, controversial or threatening to non-African-Americans as the Afro, or long hair below the collar worn by those with straight hair. African-American women began wearing the Natural by the 1970s and onward.
The conk was a major plot device in Spike Lee's film biography Malcolm X, based upon Malcolm X's own condemnation of the hairstyle in his autobiography due to its implications of the superiority of a more "white" appearance and because of the pain the process causes and the possibility of receiving severe burns to the scalp.[4]
The conk is all but extinct as a hairstyle among African-American men today, although more mildly and safely relaxed hairstyles such as the Jheri curl and the S-Curl were popular during the 1980s and 1990s.
In 2009, actor, comedian, and director Chris Rock starred in a documentary called Good Hair, which focuses on the beliefs, origins and evolution of hairstyles among the African-American community.
Culture
In the 1965 book The Autobiography of Malcolm X, it is mentioned that at one point the prevalence of the conk hairstyle, "makes you wonder if the Negro has completely lost all sense of identity, lost touch with himself".[5]
See also
References
- ^ "Conk, Afro, Jherri Curl, Dreadlocks & Afro". Jazma Hair. Retrieved 8 November 2016.
- ISSN 1362-704X.
- ^ Tyler, Bruce (1990). "Black Hairstyles, Appearance, Conduct and Cultural Democracy". The Western Journal of Black Studies. 14 (4): 235.
- ^ X, Malcolm; Haley, Alex (1965). The Autobiography of Malcolm X. New York: Grove Press.
- ISBN 9781101967805. Retrieved 2 May 2017.
External links
- Media related to Conk (hairstyle) at Wikimedia Commons
- The dictionary definition of conk at Wiktionary