Overview of 100 Objects #18: Hair Relaxer
This episode of 100 Objects explores the chemical hair relaxer as both a cultural tool and a commercial engine in Black America. Roman Mars and producer Priscilla Alabi trace how relaxers emerged from a long history of Black hair styling, became a pathway to wealth and business ownership, and also reinforced harmful beauty standards rooted in white supremacy. The episode ends by confronting newly documented health risks—especially links to fibroids and reproductive cancers—and the ongoing tension between personal choice, social pressure, and safety.
Key Takeaways
- Hair relaxers were never just cosmetic products. They shaped identity, class, labor access, and economic opportunity for generations of Black women.
- The product sits at the intersection of empowerment and assimilation. It helped Black entrepreneurs build businesses and wealth, but it also marketed straight hair as more desirable than natural hair.
- Modern research is raising serious health concerns. Studies have found associations between frequent relaxer use and uterine, ovarian, and endometrial cancers, as well as fibroids.
- The cultural pressure remains. Even as natural hair has become more accepted, Black workers still face discrimination over hairstyles in schools, workplaces, and institutions.
Historical Context: From Africa to the Drugstore
Hair as identity before slavery
- In many African societies, hair was a form of artistic expression and a marker of tribe, family, and status.
- After enslavement, hair styling became tied to survival and assimilation in a racist society that deemed Black hair “inferior.”
Early Black hair innovation
- Enslaved and later free Black people improvised hair-care methods with available materials:
- butter and grease as conditioners
- cornmeal and kerosene as shampoo
- yarn wrapping and butter knives as tools
- Skilled Black barbers and wig makers became highly sought after by white clients, and some used that income to buy freedom or fund Black institutions.
The rise of Black hair-care pioneers
- Madam C.J. Walker and Annie Turnbull Malone helped turn hair straightening into an organized Black beauty industry.
- They built businesses around hot combs, pomade, and salon culture, creating wealth and community infrastructure.
- Garrett Augustus Morgan accidentally developed an early chemical straightening formula using lye, making permanent straightening more practical.
The Relaxer Era: Popularity, Profit, and Privacy
George Johnson and mass-market relaxers
- George Johnson’s Ultra Sheen products made chemical straightening widely accessible and affordable.
- His products were especially important because they could be used at home, giving women privacy around a practice many felt ashamed of.
Black wealth and reinvestment
- Johnson became one of the most powerful Black entrepreneurs in America.
- Profits from his company were reinvested into the Black community through:
- Soul Train
- Essence
- Independence Bank in Chicago
- civil rights leaders and community hiring practices
- The episode highlights the irony that one of the first major pathways to Black millionaire status in America came from a product that encouraged Black women to alter their natural hair.
The Political Meaning of Hair
The Black Power shift
- By the 1960s and 1970s, the natural Afro became a political statement:
- a rejection of hair straightening
- a rejection of making oneself “small”
- a visible symbol of Black pride and resistance
- Even people with naturally straighter hair sometimes used perms to create a more political, natural-looking texture.
Mainstreaming and dilution
- Once the Afro was commodified by the beauty industry, its radical meaning was softened and turned into a trend.
Workplace discrimination
- The episode points to cases like Renee Rogers vs. American Airlines, where a Black woman was barred from wearing cornrows.
- The military and other institutions also treated natural Black hairstyles as unprofessional or unacceptable.
- The message to many Black workers remained: conform if you want to keep your job.
Health Risks and New Scientific Findings
What the research says
- A major NIH study followed about 34,000 women and found that frequent users of chemical straighteners were 2.5 times more likely to develop uterine cancer.
- Other research has linked relaxers to:
- fibroids
- endometrial cancer
- ovarian cancer
- The episode stresses that these are associations, not proof of causation, but they are still significant enough to warrant warning and caution.
Why this matters for Black women
- Black women experience fibroids at higher rates than other women.
- The episode argues that the risk information has not been communicated clearly enough to the public, especially in salons and on product packaging.
Broader Argument of the Episode
A product of white supremacy
The episode’s central argument is that chemical relaxers became popular because Black people were taught—directly and indirectly—that natural hair was unacceptable. That pressure made straight hair economically valuable and socially rewarded.
Complexity, not simple condemnation
The story does not reduce relaxers to “good” or “bad.” Instead, it shows:
- how they enabled entrepreneurship and social mobility
- how they offered convenience and privacy
- how they also carried shame, conformity, and now potential health harm
The core contradiction
The episode’s deepest tension is that a product created to help Black people navigate racism also profited from racism—and may have harmed the same people it served.
Notable Insights
- “Hair was never just hair.” It functioned as a political, social, and economic signal.
- “A pathway to wealth and self-improvement” can coexist with a product that enforces assimilation.
- The warning for relaxers should be as visible as warnings on cigarettes, according to the episode’s experts.
- Even with growing natural-hair acceptance, white supremacy still shapes beauty norms and workplace rules.
Bottom Line
100 Objects #18: Hair Relaxer is a history of a product, but also a history of Black survival, entrepreneurship, beauty politics, and bodily risk. It shows how chemical relaxers became embedded in American life—not just as a hairstyle choice, but as a response to racism, a source of Black wealth, and now a public health concern.