Hair-raising and makeup interviews with young people in a high school: Gender, race and sexuality

Abstract

This chapter draws on interviews conducted with learners in Grade 11 as they talk about hair and makeup. By drawing on a larger study involving focus group discussions with 16–17-year-old, school-going teenagers and their conceptualisation of gender, race, and sexuality, the chapter shows how hair and makeup was a medium through which relations of domination and subordination were expressed and contested. Makeup was regarded, in the gender-mixed interviews we conducted, as inappropriate, and a violation of school disciplinary codes. Girls who used makeup were constructed as “sluts,” but this was also challenged by questioning the sexual double standards for boys and girls. Hair emerged as a concern through which racialised constructions of heterosexual attraction was contested. Black girls in particular challenged their marginalisation at the school and also challenged racialised and gendered descriptions of heterosexual superiority. The chapter shows the significance of sexuality and the racialising processes through which hair and dress configure in young people’s discussions about disciplinary codes at school. Implications for Life Orientation lessons are discussed in the conclusion.