My Beautiful Black Hair

A collection of empowering stories and captivating photos, My Beautiful Black Hair celebrates an aspect of Black femininity--natural hair--and embraces it as a central part of Black womanhood.

My Beautiful Black Hair is a book about Black women embracing their natural hair. One hundred and one Black women share their stories of learning to love their natural hair and the immense power in that self-love.

St. Clair Detrick-Jules was inspired to write the book when her little sister, Khloe, came home from preschool where a classmate had told her that her hair was ugly. St. Clair wanted to send a message to Khloe and young Black women everywhere that their hair is beautiful just the way it is.

The stories she captured reveal both the depth of the physical and emotional damage done to many women by relaxing their hair and trying to make it look acceptable, and the incredible resilience, self-love, and acceptance they gained by learning to embrace their hair and free themselves from Eurocentric beauty standards.

Accompanied by beautiful and intimate photographs of each woman, the book is an encouraging voice for young Black women and the adults who remember their own journeys to self-acceptance.

“This is a community’s love letter to [the author’s younger sister], but it is also a self-reflective love note, an effort to agitate social constructs that have told all Black women that the bodies we are born into are not enough. The images are glorious, the anecdotes at times tender, at times seething. The entire book is powerful.”— ELIZABETH ACEVEDO New York Times bestselling author of The Poet X and Clap When You Land

“This is the book I want to gift every Black woman I know.” -Robert Jones, Jr., New York Times bestselling author of The Prophets

"My Beautiful Black Hair is a divine example of courage, self-love, acceptance, and diversity. It's a stunning collection that everyone needs to sit with, explore, and share with the little black girl in their life." -from the foreword by Alex Elle, author of After the Rain

St. Clair Detrick-Jules is an award-winning Afro-Caribbean filmmaker and photographer, whose work focuses on immigrant justice, women's rights, and Black liberation. She is the director and producer of DACAMENTED, a documentary featuring nine DACA recipients and their struggles to deal with the Trump administration. She lives in Washington, DC.

• Publisher:‎ Chronicle Books (September 28, 2021)
• Language: ‎ English
• ISBN-10:‎ 1797212192
• ISBN-13:‎ 9781797212197
• Item Weight: 1.74 pounds