Challenging Social Norms (Or, Like, How I, Like, TOTALLY Love My Hair ~*~*~*)

I haven’t had a haircut in over ten months.

Shortly before I left for my Peace Corps staging event in Philadelphia last June, I buzzed my long, curly locks completely off. I was kind of attached to my hair (figuratively as well as literally—har dee har, jerkface), so it was upsetting to take a mean old set of clippers to it and obliterate every last hank in one fell swoop. There were two specific reasons for me doing so, though: one, Africa tends to get a little warm, in case you didn’t know; and two, in one of the pre-staging documents that Peace Corps sent me, they noted that, for the sake of social acceptability in Burkina, men should keep their hair short. Well, as an embryonic aspiring PCV, I took this as gospel, and summarily dusted off my haircutting kit and made with the snip snip.

To an extent, Peace Corps did know what it was talking about in terms of hair length and how it pertains to social norms here. Every Burkinabé man has his hair closely cropped and gets it trimmed on a pretty regular basis. If you do see a guy with long hair, chances are he’s either a Rasta (and thus has a stigmatized reputation for smoking pot) or a fou (quite literally, a crazy homeless person who wanders the streets in various stages of undress). Thus, there is a very clear-cut—and clean-cut—idea of what a Burkinabé man should look like. And with that idea comes a whole host of other gender norms that Burkinabé men and women tend to follow rigorously.

In most Burkinabé social spheres—except, perhaps, those of the fabulously wealthy Burkinabé élite who live in a posh development in Ouagadougou known as Ouaga 2000 (President Blaise Compaoré has a residence there)—men are the breadwinners, and women and girls take care of everything at home. This includes fastidiously cleaning the house, doing the laundry, washing the dishes, sweeping the courtyard, going to the marché, cooking the meals, and bathing the kids (some families can have upwards of ten children). Women really are the backbone of this society. There are the nurturer-caregivers, the rock of the family, and the guiding force of the household. Their seemingly unwavering stamina despite all the work the societal mould in which they live shovels onto them is amazing to me.

Now, to avoid making this sound like a man-bashing entry, I should say that men here do their fair share of work to earn money for their families—and it isn’t usually through a cushy office job. True, there are many wealthy men who seem to do nothing all day but ride around on their new motos, fuss with their immaculate, lavish clothing, and play around with their flashy cell phones. However, the countless men in the poorer classes work as carpenters, locksmiths, welders, water-haulers (if there is a more appropriate title for this line of work, let me know), etc.

My point is that these social and professional roles are rigidly defined: men work/have careers, and the women stay home. Period. This distinction between the sexes is made pretty early on in life—during secondary school, for example. In case I haven’t mentioned it here before, you have to pay to send your kids to school here—even public school. Tuition for a year can run anywhere from $50-$100. Not a huge sum for an American, but for some Burkinabé families that money represents food on the table. So, a big family might start out by sending all of their kids to school, but as the years go on and the money runs tight and more work needs to be done in the household, the parents stop enrolling the girls in classes and just let the boys continue their studies. After all, social norms dictate that girls and women belong in the house, anyway, so what do they need to learn history, geography, science, and math for? Knowing the Pythagorean theorem ain’t gonna get the floor swept.

Maintaining a certain manner of dress and general appearance is one way through which these social paradigms are upheld. I already mentioned that Burkinabé men, outside of a few pariahs, don’t let their hair grow long. So what are people supposed to make of me, then? I’m a teacher—a very good and esteemed profession in Burkina, particularly in the bigger cities—yet I come to work every day in simple (yet appropriate) clothing and with my hair all over the place. To put it in perspective, this would be like me being a lawyer in America and coming to a hearing in plaid golf pants.

A few months ago, when my hair was on the cusp of becoming noticeably long enough to warrant a trim, I asked myself whether I cared or not if I just let it grow, weighing all the social and cultural knowledge I’ve gained since arriving here. I eventually decided that I would take a chance and not cut it, and spend the next few months testing the waters.

Well, here I am today with my hair long enough to be put in a ponytail, and what have I learned? First of all, Burkinabé don’t get angry or offended if you’re a man and you have long hair. They will be all sorts of nonplussed, though. I’ve been through a whole range of personal interactions all because of my hair here. Men have asked me if it’s a wig; women seek my advice on what they can put in their own hair to make it blonde and curly like mine; sometimes little kids just want to touch it.

What I’m hoping is, because Burkinabé don’t seem to be bothered by my hair, it’ll encourage them to think about the gender restrictions that rule their society and their tendency to sustain them. I’m not expecting my locks to start a revolution, but I’d least like to leave people here with the sense that things don’t have to be so black-and-white. I loathe male chauvinism and machismo, which I come in contact with regularly here. It’s a sobering experience when you hear Burkinabé—some of the most impoverished people on the planet—use pejoratives like “faggot” (pédé in French), but eventually you realize that this sort of behavior is borne out of a stark acquiescence to social constructs. I hope I’m not being naïve when I say that I hope these constructs can at least be challenged—if not changed.