“She does not know her beauty, She thinks her brown glory, She thinks her brown body has no glory” - Images, Nina Simone
Many brown skinned African American women find comfort in Nina’s image and are very protective other the way it is portrayed. This can be seen in the recent controversies surrounding Zoe Saldana being chosen to play Nina’s biopic in an upcoming film (Sieczkowski from Huffington Post). Sam Wayman, Nina’s brother speaks about how Nina from a very young age understood that she did not fit into American standards of beauty. However, she kept this idea with her throughout her career. “I can’t be white and I’m the kind of colored girl who looks like everything white people despise or have been taught to despise,” she wrote in a note to herself, not during her adolescence but in the years when she was already a successful performer. “If I were a boy, it wouldn’t matter so much, but I’m a girl and in front of the public all the time wide open for them to jeer and approve of or disapprove of” (Roth Pierpont). As a black female, Nina realized that because she didn’t fit into this standard of beauty the world would be a very oppressive place and try to restrict her agency.
However, Nina decides to apply a critical consciousness when she decides to not conform to European standards of beauty. This critical consciousness shines through in her song Four Women. Nina states,
“I wrote a song, ‘Four Women’, which went into these feelings a little. The women in the song are black, but their skin tones range from light to dark and their ideas of beauty and their own importance are deeply influenced by that. All the song did was to tell what entered the minds of black women in America when they thought about themselves: their complexions, their hair - straight, kinky, natural, which? - and what other women thought of them. Black women didn't know what the hell they wanted because they were defined by thing they didn't control, and until they had the confidence to define themselves they’d be stuck in the same mess forever- that was the point the song made. When ‘Four Women’ was released in 1966 some black radio stations banned DJs from playing because they said it ‘insulted’ black women. It didn’t, and banning it was a stupid thing to do, but I wasn’t surprised. The song told a truth that many people in the USA- especially black men-simply weren’t ready to acknowledge at the time” (Simone & Cleary 117)
Both Al Sheckman, and Sam Wayman speak about Nina’s hair and how she transformed from wearing wigs bouffants to afros. Up until 1964, Nina wears wigs with straight hair, that mimic a European standard of beauty (see image 1). However by 1969 Nina Simone is embracing her kinky hair (see image 2). Cohodas describes Nina appearance at the Montreux 1990 festival when she states, “Nina was full high-priestess makeup, heavy liner setting off her eyes, just the right shade of lipstick and rough to pick up the reddish stripes in the dress she was wearing, which was made out of kente cloth. Her hair was in cornrows, and to finish off the look she had returned to those long dangling earrings she used to like so much” (342) Nina Simone’s appearance as, as a brown-skinned African American female with kinky hair is clearly a political statement. Before she starts to sing at the Montreux she states, “They thought I wasn’t political anymore and what a mistake to think that” (Cohodas 342). Nina pushes aside concepts of “good hair” and pretty blue eyes and creates space for which black physical features could be attributed as beautiful. In the the decision to wear unprocessed hair and African-inspired clothing, Nina reveals this new standard of beauty that she wanted to uphold.
Nina never belittles her blackness. She is constantly unapologetically black in front of both black and white crowds of people. She highlights her race in her interviews, music, and appearance. In an interview called the “That Blackness” on The Estate of Nina Simone’s YouTube Nina states,
“I think what you are trying to ask is why am I so insistent in giving out to them that blackness that black-power that black…pushing them to identify with Black culture. I think that’s what you’re asking. It’s…I have no choice over it in the first place. To me, we are the most beautiful creatures in the whole world. Black people. And I mean that in every sense. Outside and inside and to me we have a culture that is surpassed by no other civilization but we don’t know anything about it. So again, I think I’ve said this before in this same interview, I think sometime before, my job is to somehow make them curious enough or persuade them by hook or crook to get more aware of themselves and where they came from and what they are into and what is already there and just to bring it out. This is what compels me to compel them. And I will do it by whatever means necessary.”
Nina’s image still has healing power. Her image allows women with kinky hair, brown skin, big lips and wide noses to also feel as if they too have power and agency. Nina never gives into Hollywood’s pressure to look more and more white. Her eyes never become lighter, her hair remains black, her skin remains dark, and her nose round. All the while Nina remains proud of her blackness and teaches her adoring fans how to also be unapologetically black.
Many brown skinned African American women find comfort in Nina’s image and are very protective other the way it is portrayed. This can be seen in the recent controversies surrounding Zoe Saldana being chosen to play Nina’s biopic in an upcoming film (Sieczkowski from Huffington Post). Sam Wayman, Nina’s brother speaks about how Nina from a very young age understood that she did not fit into American standards of beauty. However, she kept this idea with her throughout her career. “I can’t be white and I’m the kind of colored girl who looks like everything white people despise or have been taught to despise,” she wrote in a note to herself, not during her adolescence but in the years when she was already a successful performer. “If I were a boy, it wouldn’t matter so much, but I’m a girl and in front of the public all the time wide open for them to jeer and approve of or disapprove of” (Roth Pierpont). As a black female, Nina realized that because she didn’t fit into this standard of beauty the world would be a very oppressive place and try to restrict her agency.
However, Nina decides to apply a critical consciousness when she decides to not conform to European standards of beauty. This critical consciousness shines through in her song Four Women. Nina states,
“I wrote a song, ‘Four Women’, which went into these feelings a little. The women in the song are black, but their skin tones range from light to dark and their ideas of beauty and their own importance are deeply influenced by that. All the song did was to tell what entered the minds of black women in America when they thought about themselves: their complexions, their hair - straight, kinky, natural, which? - and what other women thought of them. Black women didn't know what the hell they wanted because they were defined by thing they didn't control, and until they had the confidence to define themselves they’d be stuck in the same mess forever- that was the point the song made. When ‘Four Women’ was released in 1966 some black radio stations banned DJs from playing because they said it ‘insulted’ black women. It didn’t, and banning it was a stupid thing to do, but I wasn’t surprised. The song told a truth that many people in the USA- especially black men-simply weren’t ready to acknowledge at the time” (Simone & Cleary 117)
Both Al Sheckman, and Sam Wayman speak about Nina’s hair and how she transformed from wearing wigs bouffants to afros. Up until 1964, Nina wears wigs with straight hair, that mimic a European standard of beauty (see image 1). However by 1969 Nina Simone is embracing her kinky hair (see image 2). Cohodas describes Nina appearance at the Montreux 1990 festival when she states, “Nina was full high-priestess makeup, heavy liner setting off her eyes, just the right shade of lipstick and rough to pick up the reddish stripes in the dress she was wearing, which was made out of kente cloth. Her hair was in cornrows, and to finish off the look she had returned to those long dangling earrings she used to like so much” (342) Nina Simone’s appearance as, as a brown-skinned African American female with kinky hair is clearly a political statement. Before she starts to sing at the Montreux she states, “They thought I wasn’t political anymore and what a mistake to think that” (Cohodas 342). Nina pushes aside concepts of “good hair” and pretty blue eyes and creates space for which black physical features could be attributed as beautiful. In the the decision to wear unprocessed hair and African-inspired clothing, Nina reveals this new standard of beauty that she wanted to uphold.
Nina never belittles her blackness. She is constantly unapologetically black in front of both black and white crowds of people. She highlights her race in her interviews, music, and appearance. In an interview called the “That Blackness” on The Estate of Nina Simone’s YouTube Nina states,
“I think what you are trying to ask is why am I so insistent in giving out to them that blackness that black-power that black…pushing them to identify with Black culture. I think that’s what you’re asking. It’s…I have no choice over it in the first place. To me, we are the most beautiful creatures in the whole world. Black people. And I mean that in every sense. Outside and inside and to me we have a culture that is surpassed by no other civilization but we don’t know anything about it. So again, I think I’ve said this before in this same interview, I think sometime before, my job is to somehow make them curious enough or persuade them by hook or crook to get more aware of themselves and where they came from and what they are into and what is already there and just to bring it out. This is what compels me to compel them. And I will do it by whatever means necessary.”
Nina’s image still has healing power. Her image allows women with kinky hair, brown skin, big lips and wide noses to also feel as if they too have power and agency. Nina never gives into Hollywood’s pressure to look more and more white. Her eyes never become lighter, her hair remains black, her skin remains dark, and her nose round. All the while Nina remains proud of her blackness and teaches her adoring fans how to also be unapologetically black.