For black women and girls, hair, culture and self-esteem as interwoven as braids

The question arrives like a missile from the back seat of my car.

I am driving and my 6-year-old daughter, Brooke, has just asked why her hair isn't real.

In my rearview mirror, I see her pixie face framed by wild strands of hair that just won't stay confined. It springs joyfully from the pigtails that I so neatly combed. I know where she is headed, but I have to ask. "What is real hair?"

"You know, like Rachel's," she answers. Rachel is our white baby sitter. What Brooke is really asking me is why her black hair texture is different. She wants hair that flings like Rachel's, not the type that springs from tightly woven braids.

Her hair journey has begun, just as it did several years ago for my oldest daughter, Nya, and for myself many decades ago.

The mother-daughter dance over hair for any culture is tricky. It's a mother's way to pass judgment and a daughter's way to rebel. It's a sign of independence and self-identity. Hair announces to the world who we are.

But for little black girls, that dance becomes more complicated. Hair is a daughter's entry point into racial differences and America's standard of beauty. It's a mother's chance to instill strong roots, if you will, to help those daughters stand proud.

Consider our hair story. We've called our hair "nappy" and been ashamed. We've pressed away roots and relaxed our kinks. Then we picked hair into huge political Afros and twisted dreadlocks to celebrate our blackness. And even now, at a time when we've redefined nappy as natural and are surrounded by choices and images that affirm us in any style we choose, our daughters are still locked in a war with their roots.

On a recent Saturday in North Dallas, five African-American mothers have gathered to talk with me. Their daughters range in age from 7 to 23, and most have attended private school with few black students. The mothers tell stories of daughters saying they aren't pretty. They share tales of white classmates who tell their daughters their noses are too wide and their hair too nappy.

The mothers say they've had hair issues of their own as children, but they grew up in neighborhoods where there were enough girls of color to make it not matter so much. Their girls, they say, are growing up in predominantly white environments that make it harder for them.

"When she was in the third grade, my daughter went through an identity crisis," says Debra Mars, 49, of Dallas. Her daughter, Zoe, is now 13. "She came home and said `Mommy, I don't want to be black anymore.' It has pained me a lot. It pains me that my children, while they have more opportunities financially, they have to put on their game face every single day and assimilate. And they should just be babies."

The mothers say that they talk to their daughters and reinforce their identities. They try to not make hair the issue and find styles that make their daughters feel good.

"As mothers, we become challenged where to put our focus and energy as we see our daughters evolve as women and women of color," says Yolanda Bruce Brooks, 48, a Dallas clinical psychologist and mother of a 23-year-old daughter who now wears her hair in a long, natural style.

"My daughter eventually gained a true sense of identity of who she is. Maybe she didn't get that from me, but I'm proud of that. It was important to me that somewhere along the line, she got it," she says.

But little brown girls scarred by their hair journey never forget.

"I'm very guarded," says Donna Jenkins, 42, the mother of two daughters, Johari, 7, and Jamila, 10. Both girls have long hair that Jenkins has braided or flat-ironed for easy styling. She wears her own hair pulled back tightly into a bun.

Her daughters are often complimented on their hair, an issue that Jenkins says she quickly puts into perspective for them.

"My sister and I, we grew up like Jamila and Johari. One of us is darker and the other lighter, except I had short hair and my sister had long hair. When people would meet us, the first thing they would say about my sister is, Oh, she has such pretty hair.' And I would sit there and think,My hair is not pretty.' So I've been quick to correct someone on a compliment," she says. "It's not good or bad hair. It's just how our genetics came out."

I grew up with a slew of cousins with "good" hair, the kind that they could wash and go. I remember believing my hair was "good," too, even though it was different. Maybe it was a gift from my mother, who just always stood proud. Maybe it's a gift from a fair-skinned aunt who always called me "the pretty little brown one."

As a child, my hair was braided. On Easter Sunday and Christmas, it was pressed and curled. And when I got near my teens, my mother relaxed it, a style I wore for most of my adult life.

Four years ago, though, I cut it all off for a short crop. I wasn't trying to make a political statement. I wasn't trying to send my daughters a message about natural hair. It was summer in Texas. I was hot. I was tired of spending money and time at the hairdresser's each week. I like to swim and take long, hot baths, hairstyle-destroying habits for a black woman with relaxed hair.

It's a freedom I hope my daughters experience one day. Right now, though, we have a lot of hair-dancing ahead.

When my oldest daughter, Nya, was 5, she too spoke wistfully of having long, straight hair. She lived in a home filled with black art and literature. And yet, she had trouble finding herself in America's image of beauty.

When she was 6, I held a gathering for a friend's new enterprise, called Nappy Hair Affair. The organization allows women of color to gather for Hair Day and help nurture each other's natural `dos. They bring food and twist locks, braid and style each other's hair. At my house, we decided to do a Hair Day for kids.

A woman named Peggy braided Nya's hair. When Peggy finished several hours later, my daughter stood up. She pranced and shook her head full of braids so much that we elders watching her began to laugh. My little girl knew she looked good. But better yet, I also could see that she felt the beauty radiating from the inside out.

At 11, Nya still likes to wear braids. And she also likes to wear her hair in a shoulder-length flip that requires a flatiron to achieve. As she grows older, she now asks for different hairstyles. Since her racial identity is still emerging, I'm sure she'll face other hair issues. But I never hear her wistfully ask for different hair anymore.

I don't think we've solved every issue about girls and their hair. But with Brooke, I know now her questions are simply a rite of passage. We talk, we read and I make sure to tell her she's beautiful. There is strength in being called the "pretty little brown one." Then I offer to braid her hair in lots of individual braids. For a 6-year-old, it's all about the flingability. The braids allow her to toss and fling.

"OK," Brooke says happily.

And for now, that is real enough.

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For more information

and stories aimed at African-American children, the following books may be helpful:

The Skin I'm In, by Sharon G. Flake (Jump at the Sun, $5.99 paperback). A novel aimed at grades 6 to 8. The book's main character is a young teen struggling with her identity.

Nappy Hair, by Carolivia Herron (Dragonfly Books, $6.99). A picture book aimed at young children.

I Love My Hair! by Natasha Anastasia Tarpley (Little, Brown, $6.99). A picture book aimed at young children.

Happy to be Nappy, by bell hooks (Jump at the Sun, $6.99). A picture book aimed at young children.

Tenderheaded: A Comb-bending Collection of Hair Stories , edited by Juliette Harris and Pamela Johnson (Pocket Books, $14). A collection of essays, poems and other writings aimed at adults.

Hair Story: Untangling the Roots of Black Hair in America, by Ayana D. Byrd and Lori L. Tharps (St. Martin's Griffin, $13.95).

Wavy, Curly, Kinky: The African American Child's Hair Guide, by Deborah R. Lilly (John Wiley & Sons, $14.95).

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(c) 2006, The Dallas Morning News. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service.