(pensive music) - [Monique] Our hair defies gravity, it is magical.

- [Koni] It's important to show you the beauty of simply being yourself in a society that tells you, "You should never be satisfied with who you are naturally."

- It's bigger than hair.

(chuckles) - Yeah.

- To us.

(laughs) (upbeat music) Hair is one of those complicated areas where we're debating and arguing about what our visible identities are and recognizing that there are a multiplicity of ways to do it but also recognizing how there is still this embedded institutionalized racism around your hair.

(upbeat music) In the 1400s, West Africa, your hair was the core part of your identity.

And once you get to the Atlantic slave trade, one of the first things that slave owners did was shave the hair of their slaves to strip away any identity.

And then once slavery ends, you're born with straighter hair, it's always gonna be luck easier for you in this world to fit in and be like everybody else.

- [April] Society kind of tells you that you need to have a certain type of texture.

You need to have a certain type of length to be beautiful.

- Our hair was almost seen as offensive - In Pennsylvania or specifically Scranton, there is a core group of black people but it's not very big, which means that most of the things that you do, you are simulating into predominantly white areas.

If they want to in any way fit in, they need to look like the people around them.

And so, relaxing is a big thing here.

If you want to be a radical, then you will braid your hair and it definitely feels like braiding your hair is a statement that I want to be seen.

- I just like this style in general.

I used to relax it like a lot because I didn't like my curly hair.

But now, I've sort of gotten used to it and I look like really pretty with these braids so it makes me more confident about my hair.

- [April] Black hair can be whatever you want.

- It is really like a form of self-expression.

- I think my hair is my palette and it makes me super happy to pick out the hair.

The best place to hear about the black experience of black hair is in here and look around you see.

- That's quite shocking.

Okay, let's do black.

- [Speaker 1] Yeah.

- When I first came here, we didn't have a lot of beauty supplies in the community.

I had to travel back to New Jersey for certain daycare products.

- You look at the migration of people that's coming from Jersey, New York and Philly, they still want to be kept up.

I have a lot of clients that say, "Hey man, you know, every two weeks I go down to Jersey or I'll go back to New York."

- Oh yeah.

- Or to Philly just to get a haircut.

- When people think about Scranton, they don't think about things they could find here.

It's like, "Oh, you in this small town."

- Where can we find these things that were used to?

- I did fall for that.

So, when I first moved here, I had a colleague, she said that there were no hairdressers in Scranton to understand how to do my hair.

So, the first time I went to the hairdressers I went to New Jersey.

So, I've been in town since June and you are the only hairdresser I've heard of.

How did you become the hairdresser of Scranton?

- We came from uptown New York and we had places to do our hair on every corner.

And then it got to a point where I would study and I would watch the African hair braiders where I would go to the shops.

I just tried to replicate what I saw and when people would see us, you know, in this area where you were not able to get styles like that, word of mouth kind of spread quickly.

Sometimes back to school nights I would have 20 people in my living room.

- Wow.

- My mother would be feeding everybody.

- Yeah.

- We would all be waiting.

They would all be waiting to get their hair done.

- Growing up here in Wilkes-Barre, you either got your hair done at home, maybe, you know, your grandmother, your auntie, but as far as being able to go to a full operating salon that catered to the needs of Black hair, it was slim pickings.

Braiding for me was like a sense of independence.

It was something that made me special that not everybody just naturally knew how to do.

There are so many people who are interested in braiding and who are interested in doing these natural hairstyles but you need a full cosmetology license to do it legally.

- Right.

- Now, you can get your natural hair braider license, but there is nowhere to get that natural hair braider license, not locally.

(upbeat music) The school that I attended, they offered every other license except natural hair breeding.

- [April] And that deters Black students, minority students to even go to cosmetology school.

The schools need to open the doors for Black teachers.

They need to promote and and desire that and this is a time where information is out there.

There's people sharing what they know.

- A lot of the skill that I learned came from watching YouTube videos.

If I did not see those videos, I'm telling you, I would've never started it.

Guys, welcome back to my channel.

It was like, okay, maybe I just need to share my journey.

So, let me just start saying what's working for me.

There's been so many women that have reached out to me via YouTube to say like, "Your tutorial taught me how to braid."

- It should be a right of passage where you learn to do your hair.

Given how important it is, particularly in today's world when we all want different styles.

- [Heather] It took me 38 years to figure out how to do my own hair and I get a lot of clients who they're mixed and their parents don't know and we can have that conversation without anyone feeling like they're being judged.

- I like that she understands my hair.

Like 'cause everybody cuts it wrong except for her.

- [Heather] Looks like we got this shape going.

How's that look to you?

- She also gave her a different understanding of how to take care of her hair.

- [Customer 1] Like how to wash it.

- [Speaker 2] And putting more, leaving conditioner in.

(upbeat music) - [Koni] Many are embracing their natural hair, accepting natural hair as it is and deeming it professional.

- [Heather] You don't know how to take care of your hair and you go to a job interview, it's very likely that you may not get the job.

You know, 'cause there's a standard of what professional looks like.

Generally, professional looks like your hair should be straight and kept and that's why there's a lot of controversy around wearing dreads or braids or hairstyles that are just naturally part of our culture because of the texture that we have.

So, folks may decide not to hire you 'cause you know, they don't want people distracted by your hair.

- My curly hair, you know, that's just a part of who I am.

So, how could that not be professional?

- Theoretically, you can do your hair anywhere you want and you recognize that this idea about being professional is really just an example of institutional racism.

So, multiple states have had to pass laws that said that you can wear your hair as you choose.

- The Crown Act is like redefining the standard of beauty in the workplace and I think that's a wonderful place to start.

- But was there an expectation that you had some sort of qualification in hair before they would give you a business loan to open a hair store?

- Well, I didn't take a loan to start my business.

My accounting background and business background definitely helped in the earlier stages and I worked and stayed aggressively.

I kind of just honed in and focused on being available to the community, to build a reputation.

- And I just want to add a little bit of hot sauce on that.

The buying process here locally for a Black owner is very interesting.

- Oh, you're putting hot sauce on.

- I said I have to.

- Oh, okay.

- I have to be honest.

It took us three tries to get this place.

- Well, to get a place.

- To get a place.

It was so much of a struggle going with credit unions in this community banks.

We have everything basically in order.

We showed how much we can pay.

The first two places we were denied, and not only that we were denied but we were denied for an amount that's significantly lower than what this place was even valued at the time.

- [Monique] The banking system is so historically racist and so, they don't give business loans to Black people and so, Black people have consistently, at least since the 1800s, right?

Have found ways to open these kind of businesses.

So, hair salons, barber shops, slowly but surely yet in the community to come and back you.

- [Koni] Before we are a business or a business owner for our community and we shouldn't forget that aspect of just being community.

- [Nathaniel] The support is needed is, it is very valuable.

Having a mentor is very needed, very valuable.

- [Monique] Don't think there's a way that we can fail if we all support each other.

But I think more and more of us are growing and learning that our natural beauty is a standard in itself.

- [Janiela] It is super important that we recognize that our hair can be a choice, right?

And look, we don't have to be indoctrinated into being told how to do our hair.

(upbeat music)