Publishers Weekly
04/06/2020
BBC correspondent Dabiri debuts with a lively and wide-ranging essay collection combining history, memoir, political jeremiad, cultural criticism, and social science. Growing up in Ireland with an Irish mother and a Nigerian father, Dabiri was “made to feel like an abomination,” whose “tightly coiled hair” presented “a problem that needed to be managed.” She describes early efforts to disguise her real hair (“from weaves, to extensions, to Jheri curls, curly perms, straight perms, and straighteners”) as “bid for assimilation,” and explores the history of black hair from traditional African braided hairstyles to the use of painful “cotton cards” to comb the hair of enslaved children in antebellum America and the rise of chemical hair straightening and skin lightening products during the early 1900s. Dabiri also examines black masculinity through the lens of a “high-profile rap beef” between Drake and Pusha T, documents cultural appropriation by white artists including Fred Astaire and Madonna, and revisits a 2017 advertising campaign that employed “the language of struggle and the overcoming of adversity” to market natural hair products to white women. Dabiri explores both her personal story and the larger history with a fierce sense of purpose and an appealing eclecticism, though her prose rarely sings. Readers will be fascinated by how deeply the story of the African diaspora is intertwined in changing attitudes toward black hair. (May)
From the Publisher
Oh, how I wish Twisted existed when I was growing. This book is a must read and more importantly, one that must be taught in schools. Emma Dabiri, a well-researched and talented writer, takes the seemingly insurmountable task of contextualizing the contributions, trials, complexities and beauty of the black hair experience in way that not only allows you to see the world more clearly, but leaves you with a hunger to learn more. And that, in my estimation, is one of greatest powers of literature. Cannot wait to see what Dabiri writes next." — Phoebe Robinson, host of 2 Dope Queens and author of You Can’t Touch My Hair
“Poignant and thoroughly researched.” — Parade
“Compelling and engrossing…. A deft geopolitical and economic meditation....Dabiri blends thorough research with incisive commentary and artful memoir...sure to become the definitive book on the politics, culture, and economics of black hair.” — Kirkus, starred review
“A complex, layered, and full history of Black hair… Dabiri carefully deconstructs this history without pathologizing the Black hair experience.” — Bitch Magazine
“Engaging and enlightening… Dabiri introduces readers to the rich, complex cultures and politics of black hair in locations around the world.” — Library Journal, starred review
“A lively and wide-ranging essay collection… Dabiri explores both her personal story and the larger history with a fierce sense of purpose and an appealing eclecticism.” — Publishers Weekly
“Written in a style that will both challenge readers and create the sense of joining in a confiding conversation with a friend, Twisted provides a new perspective on a complexly resonant topic.” — Booklist, starred review
“A triumph! Refreshingly accessible, enlightening and thorough ... an impeccably researched journey into our Black Hair and the ideas and feelings that have surrounded it, to this day.” — Yrsa Daley-Ward
“Emma Dabiri has written a fantastically interesting and original book which explores black hair through the prism of history, culture, feminism, and philosophy.” — Bernardine Evaristo, author of Girl, Woman, Other
“Both a richly researched cultural history and a voyage to empowerment.” — The Guardian
“Pulled together with meticulous research, Twisted is an unmissable read by a writer who's set to become a household name.” — Stylist (UK)
“Sensational.” — Women’s Health
“Groundbreaking...Her sources are rich, diverse and sometimes heartbreaking. Some books make us feel seen and for me, that is what Twisted does. I would urge everyone to read it.” — Charlie Brinkhurst-Cuff, The Guardian
Phoebe Robinson
Oh, how I wish Twisted existed when I was growing. This book is a must read and more importantly, one that must be taught in schools. Emma Dabiri, a well-researched and talented writer, takes the seemingly insurmountable task of contextualizing the contributions, trials, complexities and beauty of the black hair experience in way that not only allows you to see the world more clearly, but leaves you with a hunger to learn more. And that, in my estimation, is one of greatest powers of literature. Cannot wait to see what Dabiri writes next."
Yrsa Daley-Ward
A triumph! Refreshingly accessible, enlightening and thorough ... an impeccably researched journey into our Black Hair and the ideas and feelings that have surrounded it, to this day.
Parade
Poignant and thoroughly researched.
Bitch Magazine
A complex, layered, and full history of Black hair… Dabiri carefully deconstructs this history without pathologizing the Black hair experience.
Bernardine Evaristo
Emma Dabiri has written a fantastically interesting and original book which explores black hair through the prism of history, culture, feminism, and philosophy.
The Guardian
Both a richly researched cultural history and a voyage to empowerment.
starred review Booklist
Written in a style that will both challenge readers and create the sense of joining in a confiding conversation with a friend, Twisted provides a new perspective on a complexly resonant topic.
Stylist (UK)
Pulled together with meticulous research, Twisted is an unmissable read by a writer who's set to become a household name.
Women’s Health
Sensational.
Charlie Brinkhurst-Cuff
Groundbreaking...Her sources are rich, diverse and sometimes heartbreaking. Some books make us feel seen and for me, that is what Twisted does. I would urge everyone to read it.
The Guardian
Both a richly researched cultural history and a voyage to empowerment.
Stylist (UK)
Pulled together with meticulous research, Twisted is an unmissable read by a writer who's set to become a household name.
Women’s Health
Sensational.
Library Journal
★ 05/01/2020
In this engaging and enlightening work, journalist and academic researcher Dabiri introduces readers to the rich, complex cultures and politics of black hair in locations around the world. Nigerian-Irish Dabiri grew up at a time when black people in Ireland were few and far between, and both Dabiri and her hair attracted a lot of attention. Dabiri, a contributor and commentator for the Guardian and the BBC, draws on personal experience and her research background to explain hair as an expression of culture and spirituality in many African and African-diasporic cultures. She interrogates Western notions of history and respectability while delving into African ways of engaging with the past, present, and future through oral and visual storytelling, including the embodied language of hairstyles. Dabiri discusses the history of black women chemically straightening their hair, the popularity of the natural hair movement, social and political stereotypes of black hairstyles, hairstyling as social time, and gendered expectations for black women's hair. Notably, she also discusses the commercialism, consumerism, representation, colonialism, and liberation of black hair, all while incorporating reflections on her own experiences. VERDICT Highly recommended for all readers, especially given recent headlines about discrimination against black hairstyles and movements to decriminalize black hair.—Monica Howell, Northwestern Health Sciences Univ. Lib., Bloomington, MN
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2020-03-15
A historical and personal exploration of why black hair isn’t “just hair.”
From white plantation mistresses shaving enslaved women’s heads as punishment to present-day federal court rulings declaring it legal to fire black employees for wearing natural hairstyles, black hair is political. In her study of black hair cultures, BBC race correspondent Dabiri observes how, across continents and centuries, people of African descent have been subjected to “scrutiny, fetishization, or censure, and sometimes all three, because of our hair.” Black hair, writes the author, has been deemed inferior and “difficult to control” and used as a justification for discrimination. Dabiri blends thorough research with incisive commentary and artful memoir. “My own hair has been disappointing people since my birth,” she writes. Growing up Irish Nigerian in Ireland in the 1980s and ’90s, her hair was a constant source of shame and trauma. Today, in Ireland and elsewhere, black hair is still, in many cases, considered taboo. Meanwhile, the Kardashian-Jenners make millions appropriating black hair and aesthetics. Though peppered throughout with engaging pop-culture references, the book is also a deft geopolitical and economic meditation. What might Africa and her descendants have become if not for the horrors of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and colonialism? Given the abiding influence of racism and colonialism, how do we liberate and decolonize black hair? Dabiri explores the current natural hair movement and looks back at the complex successes and legacies of the first black female millionaires: early black hair care entrepreneurs Madam C.J. Walker and Annie Turnbo Malone. Compelling and engrossing, this book will satisfy readers familiar with the sizzle of the straightening comb as well as those who aren’t.
Part memoir, part social history, and sure to become the definitive book on the politics, culture, and economics of black hair. (b/w illustrations)
