On hair and anti-black transmasculinity
I wanted to share a journal entry I wrote a few days ago, just to see if someone could identify with it. Or if I’m sending it into the ether, that’s cool too.
I’ve been thinking about gender today. I always feel so dysphoric whenever I take my hair down. Its so strange because my hair is the most feminine things about me. Its like I carry all of my feminine energy in my hair. Which makes sense concerning hair in Black American culture. But sometimes, I think its wrong to think of myself in that way because I’m transmasculine; almost like I’m betraying myself? I’m sure its internalized enbyphobia (?) (I’m not too sure how I feel about that either), as I’m still examining my relationship with Black womanhood, but also, I can’t help but think of it as misogynior as well.
Like, my rejection of my natural fro is in part becasue I still outwardly present as a Black woman. And with that, I know that any masculinity attached to me will signal to people, black and non-black alike, that it is acceptable to treat me as an “ungendered woman-thing,” as opposed to an ungendered Black woman.
Interestingly, if I imagine a hypothetical version of myself where I have an outwardly masculine appearance, but a feminine hairstyle (think butterfly locs), I feel an overwhelming sense of euphoria. Contrasting again with where I was yesterday, a feminine appearance with the hair to match left me underwhelmed. Not dysphoric nor euphoric. Partially because I’m used to that version of myself but also, there’s a weird kind of pride I feel in being Black and hyperfeminine even when not fully identifying as a woman. By defying the misogynioristic notion that Black women cannot achieve femininity, or womanhood, I feel that I have triumphed over something.
And once more, when I hypothesize myself with an entirely masculine presentation, I feel apprehension, maybe wariness, as is expected of people who are Black and masculine in a white supremacist society.
If I were to make sense of all of these hypotheticals, they’re all thought exercises on Black transmasculinity as it relates to Black humanity.
I know that whatever my appearance is, no matter how euphoric or dysphoric, my humanity will always be called into question. No matter the presentation of masculinity nor femininity, in any combination or expression on a Black body, there is not “safe” presentation. Thus is intersectionality. I cannot experience the trauma of gender identity or expression without the trauma of antiblack racism. The ungendering, the degendering of Blackness is intertwined with the ungendering and degendering of my transmasculinity.
Anyways, just some thoughts while I develop my theory of transwomanism.