Now’s the Time for Wigs. If You Can Get the Hair for Them.

September 24, 2020

Picture by Erin K. Robinson

When Mia Birdsong was around 8 or 9, she’d prance around in cowboy boots and a spiky Tina Turner-style wig.

As a tween, she coveted fake manes in a wig store for their sleekness and eminent manageability, compared with the vigorous multitexture hair she’d inherited from her Black father and white mother.

“You know the story: Black kid with white mom who doesn’t know how to do her hair,” said Ms. Birdsong, an author in Oakland, Calif. “I would have these big bangs I’d do with a curling brush. Basically, the front and sides would be straight. And the back wouldn’t.”

Wigs give the illusion of all-over-the-head uniformity, she thought. “It was all about, like, long flowing hair, too,” she said. “I was super into wigs that gave me white women’s straight hair.”

Read full article at Washington Post