Narrative Healing: Writing Our Hair

Writing—aka narrative healing—about life experiences impacted by our hair illuminates both the absurdity of trying to enforce white haircare grooming standards on African American and Latina women, and the muted but invasive means by which society shames our natural hair from infancy through adulthood.

This supportive writing workshop is a safe, nurturing, intentional space to write and share your hair stories vis-à-vis career and school challenges, relationships, family, and everyday life. Writing about one of the still-remaining systemic biases in academic and corporate America can lead to greater self-respect, understanding, strength, and a sense of agency. Led by Lyzette Wanzer, editor of Trauma, Tresses, & Truth: Untangling Our Hair Through Personal Narrative (Chicago Review Press, 2022).