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Moe Williams

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What are you doing with your hair right now?

Right now i have it in braids. It's mostly for the track team, so that my hair wasn’t blowing in the wind. For athletics, it made my head more aerodynamic, so my hair wouldn’t get caught in the wind. My times wouldn’t be messed up because of that. Also for boat dance, I decided to get my hair done, so I’d have a cool style.

 

Where did you get this style from?

Myself. My mom would always tell me to braid my hair because she thinks it looks bad. She doesn’t like the way it's cut when I take my braids out and wash it and condition it. She says it looks like some type of mushroom. I mean I don’t mind it, but she doesn’t really like it that much.

 

Do you go to a barbershop?

I used to go to a barbershop until my uncle decided that he wanted to leave the barbershop and start his own. I’ve been getting hair cuts from my uncle ever since I was born, so I just go to him.

 

How important is the relationship with the person cutting your hair?

Very important. You have to put a lot of trust in. If you have a bad relationship with a barber, they can--can I swear?-- fuck your shit up. I’ve seen videos where people will get in arguments with their barbers or a kid will be bad in school and his barber will get upset and shave a section of their hair. It would just look awful.

 

Have you ever not liked a haircut?

I tried to cut my hair one time with kid scissors. It didn’t go as well because I had an afro that was pretty big. I tried to cut my hair to give it a little trim, but instead I had a bald spot for the next two months.

 

How’d you feel?

Stupid. I tried to do what my uncle can do without any type of training. I was in the 5th or 6th braid and wanted to learn how to cut my own hair. I decided one day in the middle of class to try it. No mirror or nothing. I didn’t know what I was doing. I saw a big ass chunk fall out and felt the bald spot. I was embarrassed. People were laughing too.

 

What’s considered a good haircut vs a bad haircut?

I think it depends on the person. For me, I won’t cut my hair short again unless I get waves. Lineups are so important. You know how girls have edges, that's what a lineup is for a dude. You need to make sure it's not slanted and that everything is symmetrical. A nice fade makes everything look good.

 

Has anyone ever said anything to make fun of your hair?

My mom calls it a mushroom, a bunch of kids call it an “atomic bomb”, and broccoli head. It's usually the white kids who say my hair looks like an atomic bomb or broccoli as they try to touch it.

 

What are some of the challenges that come with having your hair like this at a PWI?

It's hair, but white students look at it like it's something more or less than hair. They look at it like, “what the hell is on top of your head?” Or they tell you what you should do with your hair, and I’m just going to do what makes me happy. They’ll tell me what they like better or what hairstyle that I did that they liked more. Sometimes they’ll show me a crazy hairstyle like the “Grumby” and tell me to do that. It's not the 90s so I don’t know why.

 

Do you ever feel like your hair is superior to other people of other races?

We get to do whatever the hell we want with our hair. For other people, they wake up and it just looks like whatever. They can’t do that much with it. For us, we can straighten it, do braids, and cut it. We can do so much more.
 

Why is a fresh cut so important?

It's not that it's important, but for me when I cut my hair, I cut it either for an event, if I want to get my eyebrows done, or if I want to get braids. I really don’t need to cut my hair because people can’t see my lineup anyway.

 

Do you use any products in your hair?

I’ll go through my weekly process: I have some argan oil that I apply to my hair after I wash my hair twice and deep condition it. I leave the conditioner for the night and when I wake up, I wash it and recondition it again. Then I apply the oil again along with Cantu. I would not shampoo my hair for the next two days, so I condition it two times a week. I try to stay on schedule. I use Cantu, Shea Moisture, and Argan Oil. No one really taught me how to do this-- I came up with it myself.

 

How does your hair reflect your identity?

As a black male and a black man and as a black person in general, I’m going to get a lot of judgement about my hair because it's different than the majority. I have to do a lot with my hair. Sometimes when I get a haircut, I even put in designs because it's just a cool thing to do. I value fun and hair should be fun. I also like to be different. By doing designs and changing it up, I get to do something different.

 

Why do black men take so much pride in their hair?

What’s funny about that is that I don’t think that black men take a lot of pride in their hair. Have you seen the students here? As far as my grade goes, they don’t care at all or give two shits. I’m always thinking like, “bro, this is what you look like now and this is what your hair could be looking like if you take care of it.” I don’t think that they care about hair. Apparently, waking up in the morning and not doing your hair seems to be a thing nowadays. They look like they don’t care, and people expect all of us to look that way. This brings a lot of questions to me because I look different. Taking pride in your hair is taking care of it.