Coming to a town near you - Dr. Joanne Cornwell for a "That Hair Thing: The Sisterlocks Approach" book signing event...

Sisterlocks Book Signings!

She’s been EAST and she’s been WEST and now…
Dr. JoAnne Cornwell is waiting to come to your town!!

With wit, insight and humor, Dr. Cornwell will bring her unique prospective on “The Natural Hair Revolution” to your group to sign and discuss her latest book,

That Hair Thing, 2nd Edition!

After successful Book Signings and Panel Discussions in Oakland, CA; Baltimore, MD and Philadelphia, PA, Dr. Cornwell is all set to visit these cities in 2010:

Atlanta, GA - Fri, Sat & Sun, Feb. 19-21;
Dallas, TX - Saturday, Feb. 27;
Teaneck, NJ - Friday, March 5;
“HUE-MAN” Bookstore in Harlem, NY - Sat, Mar. 6;
Brooklyn, NY - Sunday, Mar. 7;
Durham, NC - Saturday, April 10;
San Diego, CA - Friday, April 16;
Chicago, Il - Saturday, April 17;
Detroit/Ann Arbor, MI - Sunday, April 18;
Northern NJ - Sunday, April 25;
DC / VA - Saturday, May 1;
Miami, FL - Saturday, May 15;

To invite Dr. Cornwell for a Meet and Greet – Book Signing event Call Carol at 858-248-6196

That Hair Thing
(and the Sisterlocks Approach)

Read about why our natural hair issues have been such a sensitive issue for African American culture.Contains 50 pages of gorgeous color pictures - including kids, youth and adults of all ages!

Available from your local Sisterlocks Consultant OR

Order directly from the Sisterlocks website: http://www.sisterlocks.com/ OR

By phone at 800-456-5032

_____________________________

From the Sisterlock website. Hoping Sister Jo doesn't mind my clipping this...after all, it's free advertising! ;o)

See y'all at the signing in the ATL this Sunday...for details, follow the links below...

Click here to check out
The Atlanta Sisterlocks Meetup!

...or click the "Atlanta Sisterlocks Meetup" badge in the sidebar

Keeping your sisterlocks permed ends intact

Nicky asked:

How did u keep ur permed ends from breaking off hardcore with the strong loc texture at the top?
______________________________________

DL:

Hi Nicky,

I couldn't keep them from breaking off, but I was able to slow down the process. After all, my ends were permed and therefore, weaker than my natural hair. But I think the following things helped slow the process:

• I didn't wash my hair excessively - Only once or twice between retightenings.
• I NEVER used a curling iron or other heating implements, except for a bonnet dryer.
• I never lifted color out to lighten my hair.
• I continued to bind the permed ends very well and EVERYTIME I shampooed to avoid bunching. [You can loose 1/4 of your ends with one bad episode of bunching!]

But slowly losing the ends is unavoidable. When my hair was wet, you could really tell the difference between the roots and the straggly ends.

The final ten month photo that shows coily, full ends is an due entirely to the 'braid-out' hair style!

Sisterlock Texture Shot Photos: My second Loc' iversary

My how time flies. In two weeks it'll be two years - February 3, 2008.

Our annual MLK weekend ski trip always get me remembering my "installation anticipation."

No slope photos this year. I went out with the guys only on Saturday and my camera batteries died early, but I took a few inside shots.

Texture shots follow...

Gotta acknowledge those seasoned sisterlocks bloggers that inspired me when I was just a "contemplative."

Amba
Maryee
Brunsli
Kalia-Dewdrop
Sophia, Naturally
Blaqkofi

...there are others and I'll grow the list as their names come to me...

On Chris Rock and the movie "Good Hair": The Sisterlocks Response

I was lurking on Mimi's blog, Naturally Rooted, and discovered this video - Dr. Cornwell's response to Chris Rock's "Good Hair."

You'll love the parade of styles at the end of part three of the video - Dr. Cornwell's gift to Chris Rocks daughters.

As Dr. Cornwell says, we don't have 'problem hair', we just don't know it yet...







Peace, love and self-acceptance,
DL

Kwanzaa Decor at My Moms' Place 2009

Kwanzaa Heri Sisters!
(and lurking brothers :o)

Just a few pretty Kwanzaa decorations on my moms fireplace mantle for you to enjoy below.



Kikombe cha Umoja (Unity cup)



Cute circular kinara (candle holder)




Mazao (Crops)




Vibunzi (corn) and the Mkeka (woven mat)





Mom's fireplace Kwanzaa display

And a Kwanzaa decorating segment with Sheila Bridges featuring interior designer, Tangie Murray.

"Sisterlocks on Pipe Cleaners" Photos

My first Pipe cleaner set!

And I didn't like it :o( - Maybe I did something wrong.

Went back to binding, just a bit, since I had a couple sisterlocks come undone after I clipped my ends a few months ago.

I've been using Suave clarifying shampoo and Herbal Essence Drama Clean.

Sisterlocks on pipe cleaners...and the result...

Interesting. Sorta looks like...ummm...let's see...

...Pipe Cleaners!

I don't like it as much as I do when I set my hair on my "spongeless sponge rollers." The ends are flyaway and not coiled as I had expected.

Gonna be goin' back to using my trusty spongeless sponge rollers. My old flexible rod rollers were great for my braid-outs when I had permed ends, but I had to abandon the flexible rod rollers once my sisterlocks grew and thickened and I cut my permed ends off.

Still though, it nice to be "loc'd up and lye-free" :o)

Sisterlocks Photos at 21 months...

I think I trimmed my permed ends a bit too much in the top and on one side of my head in the back.

Before my re-tightening this week

No photos for you, but one loc near nape and another near my crown came completely undone.

Julia decided to combine the few strands near my nape with a neighboring loc. She re-loc'd the one on the crown of my head.

After my re-tightening this week

Just showing some scalp. My parts are looks less like lines and more like intersecting grids.

Julia says that she will continue to do use reverse-4 pattern on my hair until she sees less of the pattern toward the middle of my locs.

When they say it can take a couple of years to be truly loc'd, they aren't kidding.

When I first considered locking my hair, I briefly had some of the African woman's "my hair is not straight enough" anxiety - but in the reverse. I was worried that my hair is not coily enough to loc quickly (I was thinking 6 to 9 months and viola)

Sometimes I see other women's hair and compare their hair to mine and I think, "My hair is not as coily as hers," as though it's inferior because it's not as coily.

It's surreal.

Sisterlocks Photos: 20 Months plus update

Remember Raheemah?

(see: Dr. JoAnne Cornwell speaks at the Inaugural Meeting of the Atlanta Sisterlocks Meetup Group - March '08)

Her sisterlocks consultant is Master Consultant, Calla?

Well, she trimmed her sisterlocks...

...and darkened them.

Raheemah's advice: Don't lift too much color, too regularly! Your locs will suffer!

_____________________

Visit Blaqkofi's blog to read about her "loc loss" experience after too much bleaching...

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20 month photos:

"Black women are ugly..."

The start of the school year and thoughts about our children brought this post to mind. Enjoy the re-run.

_______

[Originally posted March 24, 2008 at 4:46 PM]

I teared when I first watched the film A Girl Like Me, directed by young Kiri Davis, 3 years ago. Below is a 7 minute clip.

This disturbing film documents the fact that the pivotal Kenneth and Mamie Clark experimental findings, are as valid today as they were in the 1930's. Sadly, our children still prefer the white doll to the Black doll.

Used to argue several Brown vs. Board of Education law suits in support of integrated schools, the actual data set is rarely if ever examined.

In fact, the Clark's data actually revealed that more children in integrated northern schools preferred and would rather play with the white doll than children in segregated southern schools.

I'd bet you didn't know that.

Moreover, the Clarks found that after Black children entered segregated schools, they approved more highly of the Black dolls. Translation: during the formative years, Black children feel better about themselves when educated in a nurturing environment of adults and children who look like them.

One of the actual data sets:
Children at northern, integrated schools vs. Children at southern, segregated schools

Prefer to play with white doll: 72% vs. 62%
White doll is "nice" 68% vs. 52%
Black doll is "bad" 71% vs. 49%

None of the numbers above are good, but the trend is undeniable. What can I say except, 'Don't believe the hype.'

Support African-centered Saturday programs like the one my son has attended at Nsoromma School.

Additional web resources are available to you through the Black Homeschoolers Network and, here in Atlanta, AYA Educational Institute.

Recommended reading: Developmental Psychology of the Black Child and other books by Dr. Amos Wilson.

Finally, there is a wonderful article about sisterlocks, our daughters, self esteem and locking children's hair in Vol. 2, No. 2. of the Sisterlocks Journal. Giovonnie Samuels, the sisterlocked, Nickelodeon child-star is on the cover.

Dr. JoAnne Cornwell the innovator of sisterlocks has an academic appointment in the Department of Africana Studies at San Diego State University.)

Natural Hair Poetry (by Dr JoAnne Cornwell)

More hair poetry posts here

"How do you wash those things?" (and some lovely locs encountered this summer)

My dad asked the question..."So when you wash those things, they don't come out?

A sister wtih traditional locs from New Jersey that I encountered in the airport in Houston

I pretended not to hear him. We were on a tour bus at our family reunion and the engine was rather loud. He was sitting behind me.

A brother who was on our flight from Atlanta (Nice lats!)

But then he leaned forward and, rather loudly, continued, "I said, how do you wash those things?"

A sisterlocked mom and her daughter who just happened to be on the escalator ahead of us at Hartsfield-Jackson airport (Mom has been SL'd 8 years)

I turn around so he could hear me. "With shampoo. Like the way you wash your hair," I said in my most "uh-duh" -like voice.

A mom with traditional locs and her cuties atop Stone Mountain

That was it. I guess, since he last saw me this past spring, someone must have explained to him that I have locs.

;o)

"...unfit to represent America..." ---Black Hair, Still Tangled in Politics

[New York Times ]

Skin Deep: Black Hair, Still Tangled in Politics

By CATHERINE SAINT LOUIS
Published: August 27, 2009

SILKY straight hair has long been considered by many black women to be their crowning glory. So what if getting that look meant enduring the itchy burning that’s a hallmark of many chemical straighteners. Or a pricey dependence on “creamy crack,” as relaxers are sometimes jokingly called.

Getting “good hair” often means transforming one’s tightly coiled roots; but it is also more freighted, for many African-American women and some men, than simply a choice about grooming.

Anyone who thought such preconceptions were outdated would have been reminded otherwise by some negative reactions to the president’s 11-year-old daughter, Malia Obama, who wore her hair in twists while in Rome this summer. Commenters on the conservative blog Free Republic attacked her as unfit to represent America for stepping out unstraightened...read more here