Body Hair: From Ancient Depilatories to Modern Feminist Practices
Carly Spurlock
There is a major misconception that the practice of body hair removal began in the early 1900s. This idea is completely false. The practice of hair removal is “neither... modern nor purely Western” (Toerien, Wilkinson, and Choi 399). Humans have been removing their hair since the caveman era. This paper will explore the ideas of shaving, depilatories, when in history these practices began, and how they relate to feminism. Some major misconceptions related to hair will be abolished by proving that: hair removal began long before it became popular in America in the 1900s, hair and hairstyles have different meanings in different cultures and races, hair removal can actually feed into pedophilia, and feminists began boycotting shaving in the second wave of feminism.
Prehistoric Times
Reflecting all the way to the beginnings of human beings, we can see that cavemen were the first to start the practice of body hair removal. Their reasoning for it did not, however, have anything to do with fashion or appearance. Cavemen removed their facial hair to keep mites off of their bodies as much as possible, and they removed their head hair to keep other men from grabbing and pulling on it during fights (Knight 1). These men did not use razors or depilatories (agents, usually liquids or creams, used to remove hair) like we have now in modern culture. They instead used rocks to scrape their hair off, often taking more than just hair (Knight 1). Ancient Egyptians had similar practices. Egyptians “associated hairlessness with cleanliness… [for] both men and women” (Bondy 26). They, however, had better technology than the cavemen. Egyptians used flint or bronze “razors” and what is called “sugaring”- a process much like modern waxing. Sugaring involved using sticky paste (most often beeswax), rubbing it on the hair, pressing a cloth to it, and ripping the cloth off, taking the hair with it (Knight 1). Egyptian, Greek, and Middle Eastern women removed all of their body hair, only leaving their eyebrows intact. Women weren’t the only ones removing hair though. It was unacceptable for men to have facial hair; only the lower classes (usually slaves and servants) had facial hair (Knight 1). Women in the Roman Empire used pumice stones, razors, tweezers, depilatory creams, and a process called “threading” to remove their hair. Threading involved taking a piece of string or yarn between two hands and rubbing the string across the hair quickly to rip the hair out of the skin (Knight 1).
The misbelief that hair removal began in the early 1900s has its roots in the fact that European women never removed their armpit, leg, or pubic hair. Instead, the first time European women were recorded removing body hair was in the middle ages when it was fashionable to have very long brows. To achieve the look of a long brow line, European women would remove their eyebrows completely and even take off the hair from their foreheads (Knight 1). This look was so fashionable that women would often rub walnut oil on their babies’ foreheads to prevent hair growth (Knight 1). The reason many Americans believe that the practice of hair removal began in the early 1900s is because Americans’ origins are rooted in Europe where hair removal was largely not happening. American women did not start shaving until the 1900s, but hair removal had been happening long before then.
Recent History
The first modern razor was invented in France in the 1760s by a barber named Jean Jacques Perret (Knight 1). The razor was named the Perret razor, after its creator, and was much safer than any previous form of hair removal. In the 1880s, however, a man named King Gillette invented an even safer razor, marking the beginning of the reigning franchise still thriving today: Gillette razors (Knight 1). The first women’s razor was designed in 1915. Within the same year, the magazine Harpers Bazaar published an issue displaying a model in a sleeveless dress with cleanly shaved armpits (Knight 1). Because of events such as these, 1915 is often considered the beginning of body hair removal for American women. Gillette Razor Company can be thanked for playing a large role in making shaving a societal norm for women. The company began targeting women specifically. Women began wearing sleeveless, shorter-length dresses and with the new revelations of skin, women began shaving their armpits and legs. Swimming started becoming a recreational sport in the early to mid 1900s and swimwear became more of a fashion statement. This is when women began removing their pubic hair as well (Friebur 38). Beginning in the 1920s, in North America, “women were pressured towards having a hairless, childlike body” while men were viewed as physically and sexually mature if they had body hair (Bondy 26).
Hair Removal Today: Race, Culture, Pedophilia, and Feminism
In a book called Recovering the Black Female Body, Michael Bennett and Vanessa Dickerson ask readers why hair has to have the same meaning to everyone and why it has to have meaning at all (Bennett and Dickerson 279). These authors are first and foremost referring to head hair in this article. They focus on African American hair and how it is being compared to Caucasian hair in modern America, especially among women. African American women are expected by society to straighten and “tame” their hair so that they their hairstyles are the same as white women’s. Bennett and Dickerson go on to say that “there have been consequences both within and outside of African American communities for wearing one’s race wrong” (Bennett and Dickerson 280). They also make it clear that the human body is a “battlefield,” not a “playground.” By this they mean that the body should not be discussed without factoring in considerations of race, gender, and class (Bennett and Dickerson 282). In 1996, Meghan Smith, a nine year old African American girl, went into her third grade class one day with her hair cornrowed. She was immediately sent to the principal who then sent her home. The principal and school administrators claimed that Meghan’s hairstyle was “extreme,” distracting and disruptive, and a violation of the school’s dress code. The administrators claimed that the braided hairstyle “clashed with the spiritual and educational mission of the school” and she would not be allowed to come back to school until she changed the style (Bennett and Dickerson 284).
Unfortunately, Meghan Smith’s is only one of many stories where African American women, in particular, are forced to change their hairstyles in order to be deemed acceptable. What people like the school administrators do not understand is that African American hair is different than white people’s and holds different cultural meaning. Braided hairstyles have great significance in African American culture; African Americans celebrate their history and ancestry through braided hairstyles, and these styles are symbolic of their community (Bennett and Dickerson 286). White women such as Madonna and Christina Aguilera are known for cornrowing their hair in the past. These women are praised for having “‘discovered’ a whole new world of beauty” (Bennett and Dickerson 290). The problem with this is that, first of all, white women did not discover this hairstyle; African Americans have been braiding their hair for centuries. Second, when white women began cornrowing their hair, they turned it into a fashion statement, erasing all of the cultural significance of the hairstyle. These white women felt no repercussions for wearing their hair in such a fashion; they were praised for being so bold and creative. However, African American women are being ostracized daily for wearing their hair the same exact way. For example, employers are legally able to prohibit employees from wearing their hair in braided hairstyles. In 1991, one airline employer fired an African American flight attendant with cornrows because he thought that the passengers would be frightened by the hairstyle (Bennett and Dickerson 289). The woman took her case to federal court and the court ruled on the employer’s side.
From article to article, story to story, the word “acceptable” is continually brought up. Many of the employers that have fired African American women for wearing their hair in cornrows believe that the hairstyle is unacceptable. The problem with this is that the standards for what is considered acceptable or not are solely based on white people and their hairstyles. White and black hair are not the same and do not carry the same cultural meaning. So, going back to Bennett’s and Dickerson’s proposed question, why does society expect hair to have the same meaning through all cultures? The idea that all hair should be the same, look the same, and feel the same is oppressive to people outside of the Caucasian race. The oppression does not stop with Caucasian people forcing expectations on other race’s hairstyles, though. Even African American women are targeting other women of color by marketing beauty products to them, telling them that they should all play into this idea that their hairstyles should resemble white women’s hairstyles. This is a subconscious reinforcement of the oppression facing women of color (Bennett and Dickerson 283). This dilemma does not only apply to head hair though. There are standards for body hair just as much as for head hair. Our society is not accepting of women with armpit, leg, or pubic hair. These standards are extremely oppressive to women socially and economically. It is expensive to continually remove body hair or to continually get African American hair done so that it matches white women’s hair.
Adding onto the standards for women in the American society is the expectation that women’s bodies should be pure, smooth, and hairless. These characteristics all match the characteristics of a preadolescent girl. Adolescent and adult females are infantilized and taught by society to be submissive. It has become apparent that there are serious consequences to society valuing childlike traits in women. When women remove their body hair, including pubic hair, their bodies revert to looking preadolescent, inadvertently training men to be attracted to preadolescent female bodies. Robin Friebur bluntly states that there is a “link between hair removal and pedophilia” because “a man who is socialized to become erotically aroused by an infantilized woman may be primed to also become erotically aroused by children” (Friebur 38). This idea of the “ideal woman” being hairless is solidified by contemporary pornography (Bondy 27). Pornography is extremely accessible today and is widely accepted. Women are able to compare their own bodies to the women’s bodies in the pornography, and then emulate what they see: a hairless, childlike body (Bondy 27).
Beginning in the second wave of feminism, feminists started to boycott hair removal. Along with “bra burning” and the “Freedom Trashcan”, feminists fought back against the idea that women must shave. Feminists are often stereotyped as being fat, ugly, hairy lesbians. The second wave feminists are the reason “hairy” is added onto that stereotype. Ever since second wave feminists started growing their hair out, many other feminists have been inspired to do the same. Renee Bondy wrote an article called “Rhymes with Cubic Pear” and in it she said that she chose to grow her hair out for the purpose of the article. She said that “it’s hard to explain, but with hair on my body I felt stronger, bolder and bigger- like I took up a bit more space” (Bondy 29). Bondy has taken up the fight to defy the picture of the “ideal woman” that our society currently holds, that women must be small, take up little space, and be submissive.
There is a recurring theme among women who choose to boycott shaving for a specific reason, like how Bondy chose to stop shaving for her article or women who do it for a class or experiment. Most of these women go back to removing their hair as soon as the article is written and the class is over. If women want to prove that body hair removal should not be a social norm, then more women need to stand by it, permanently, because right now, it is easy to perceive women boycotting shaving as a one-time social experiment that’s just for fun. Tracy Moore sums this up this sentiment in an article called “400 Years of Women Removing their Body Hair.” She says:
“Like so many aspects of maintaining supposed femininity… I think it all comes down to doing what you feel comfortable doing… Although with stuff like this that’s so steeped in our very notion of femaleness, it becomes increasingly harder to pretend this is a choice ever made free of an utter barrage of influence in one (hairless) direction. And I think it’s really important to know that, and to empower women to move toward a definition of femininity that is less harmful to our psyche. And our actual vaginas” (Moore 4).
Within the past year, a trend has broken out among feminists. It all started when a hairstylist, Roxie Hunt, wanted to see if armpit hair could be dyed different colors. She convinced a friend to let her armpit hair be used for the experiment. Roxie posted a blog on a website called Offbeat Home about the entire experience. She explained in detail how she bleached and dyed her friend’s armpit hair blue. Roxie admitted that she didn’t believe the dye would actually stick to armpit hair, but she was pleasantly surprised when it did. In her blog she said “I felt a major win for body hair” (Hunt 1). After posting the experience on her blog, women all across the country began dyeing their armpit hair extravagant colors, too, sparking a trend.
As you can see, the practice of hair removal has been around for many thousands of years, contrary to American belief. It is also much more complicated than most people think. Many people argue that hair removal is no longer sexist, in America at least, because many men are being expected to remove their hair as well. However, this trend affects a much smaller portion of men, while virtually all women are expected to remove their hair. As reported in the article “Body Hair Removal,” the practice of depilatories and shaving reinforce the idea that the “woman’s body is unacceptable if left unaltered” (Toerien, Wilkinson, and Choi 400). Once again, the word unacceptable is presented, a common theme in the topic of hair. The American society places excesive standards on its women today. These standards are sexist and oppressive because not all women place the same value or meaning on their hair; some women place no meaning on it- and why should they? Hair is a natural occurrence on the male and female bodies. Women should not all be forced into one very small and restrictive box of hairlessness in order to be accepted. Women’s bodies, natural and unique, should be celebrated, not stripped and broken.
Works Cited
Bennett, Michael, and Vanessa D. Dickerson, eds. Recovering the Black Female Body. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2001. Print.
Bondy, Renee. “Rhymes with Cubic Pear.” Herizons Spring 2010: 25-29. Print.
Friebur, Robin. “Shaving is the Pits.” Off Our Backs May-June 2005: 37-38. Print.
Hunt, Roxie. “How to dye your armpit hair.” Offbeat Home & Life. FM Living. Web. 7 December 2014.
Knight, Eliza. “Historical Methods of Hair Removal.” History Undressed. Web. 7 December 2014.
Moore, Tracy. “400 Years of Women Removing their Body Hair.” Jezebel. Kinja. Web. 7 December 2014.
Toerien, Merran, Sue Wilkinson, and Precilla Y. L. Choi. “Body Hair Removal: The ‘Mundane’ Production of Normative Femininity.” Sex Roles March 2005: 399-406. Print.
Prehistoric Times
Reflecting all the way to the beginnings of human beings, we can see that cavemen were the first to start the practice of body hair removal. Their reasoning for it did not, however, have anything to do with fashion or appearance. Cavemen removed their facial hair to keep mites off of their bodies as much as possible, and they removed their head hair to keep other men from grabbing and pulling on it during fights (Knight 1). These men did not use razors or depilatories (agents, usually liquids or creams, used to remove hair) like we have now in modern culture. They instead used rocks to scrape their hair off, often taking more than just hair (Knight 1). Ancient Egyptians had similar practices. Egyptians “associated hairlessness with cleanliness… [for] both men and women” (Bondy 26). They, however, had better technology than the cavemen. Egyptians used flint or bronze “razors” and what is called “sugaring”- a process much like modern waxing. Sugaring involved using sticky paste (most often beeswax), rubbing it on the hair, pressing a cloth to it, and ripping the cloth off, taking the hair with it (Knight 1). Egyptian, Greek, and Middle Eastern women removed all of their body hair, only leaving their eyebrows intact. Women weren’t the only ones removing hair though. It was unacceptable for men to have facial hair; only the lower classes (usually slaves and servants) had facial hair (Knight 1). Women in the Roman Empire used pumice stones, razors, tweezers, depilatory creams, and a process called “threading” to remove their hair. Threading involved taking a piece of string or yarn between two hands and rubbing the string across the hair quickly to rip the hair out of the skin (Knight 1).
The misbelief that hair removal began in the early 1900s has its roots in the fact that European women never removed their armpit, leg, or pubic hair. Instead, the first time European women were recorded removing body hair was in the middle ages when it was fashionable to have very long brows. To achieve the look of a long brow line, European women would remove their eyebrows completely and even take off the hair from their foreheads (Knight 1). This look was so fashionable that women would often rub walnut oil on their babies’ foreheads to prevent hair growth (Knight 1). The reason many Americans believe that the practice of hair removal began in the early 1900s is because Americans’ origins are rooted in Europe where hair removal was largely not happening. American women did not start shaving until the 1900s, but hair removal had been happening long before then.
Recent History
The first modern razor was invented in France in the 1760s by a barber named Jean Jacques Perret (Knight 1). The razor was named the Perret razor, after its creator, and was much safer than any previous form of hair removal. In the 1880s, however, a man named King Gillette invented an even safer razor, marking the beginning of the reigning franchise still thriving today: Gillette razors (Knight 1). The first women’s razor was designed in 1915. Within the same year, the magazine Harpers Bazaar published an issue displaying a model in a sleeveless dress with cleanly shaved armpits (Knight 1). Because of events such as these, 1915 is often considered the beginning of body hair removal for American women. Gillette Razor Company can be thanked for playing a large role in making shaving a societal norm for women. The company began targeting women specifically. Women began wearing sleeveless, shorter-length dresses and with the new revelations of skin, women began shaving their armpits and legs. Swimming started becoming a recreational sport in the early to mid 1900s and swimwear became more of a fashion statement. This is when women began removing their pubic hair as well (Friebur 38). Beginning in the 1920s, in North America, “women were pressured towards having a hairless, childlike body” while men were viewed as physically and sexually mature if they had body hair (Bondy 26).
Hair Removal Today: Race, Culture, Pedophilia, and Feminism
In a book called Recovering the Black Female Body, Michael Bennett and Vanessa Dickerson ask readers why hair has to have the same meaning to everyone and why it has to have meaning at all (Bennett and Dickerson 279). These authors are first and foremost referring to head hair in this article. They focus on African American hair and how it is being compared to Caucasian hair in modern America, especially among women. African American women are expected by society to straighten and “tame” their hair so that they their hairstyles are the same as white women’s. Bennett and Dickerson go on to say that “there have been consequences both within and outside of African American communities for wearing one’s race wrong” (Bennett and Dickerson 280). They also make it clear that the human body is a “battlefield,” not a “playground.” By this they mean that the body should not be discussed without factoring in considerations of race, gender, and class (Bennett and Dickerson 282). In 1996, Meghan Smith, a nine year old African American girl, went into her third grade class one day with her hair cornrowed. She was immediately sent to the principal who then sent her home. The principal and school administrators claimed that Meghan’s hairstyle was “extreme,” distracting and disruptive, and a violation of the school’s dress code. The administrators claimed that the braided hairstyle “clashed with the spiritual and educational mission of the school” and she would not be allowed to come back to school until she changed the style (Bennett and Dickerson 284).
Unfortunately, Meghan Smith’s is only one of many stories where African American women, in particular, are forced to change their hairstyles in order to be deemed acceptable. What people like the school administrators do not understand is that African American hair is different than white people’s and holds different cultural meaning. Braided hairstyles have great significance in African American culture; African Americans celebrate their history and ancestry through braided hairstyles, and these styles are symbolic of their community (Bennett and Dickerson 286). White women such as Madonna and Christina Aguilera are known for cornrowing their hair in the past. These women are praised for having “‘discovered’ a whole new world of beauty” (Bennett and Dickerson 290). The problem with this is that, first of all, white women did not discover this hairstyle; African Americans have been braiding their hair for centuries. Second, when white women began cornrowing their hair, they turned it into a fashion statement, erasing all of the cultural significance of the hairstyle. These white women felt no repercussions for wearing their hair in such a fashion; they were praised for being so bold and creative. However, African American women are being ostracized daily for wearing their hair the same exact way. For example, employers are legally able to prohibit employees from wearing their hair in braided hairstyles. In 1991, one airline employer fired an African American flight attendant with cornrows because he thought that the passengers would be frightened by the hairstyle (Bennett and Dickerson 289). The woman took her case to federal court and the court ruled on the employer’s side.
From article to article, story to story, the word “acceptable” is continually brought up. Many of the employers that have fired African American women for wearing their hair in cornrows believe that the hairstyle is unacceptable. The problem with this is that the standards for what is considered acceptable or not are solely based on white people and their hairstyles. White and black hair are not the same and do not carry the same cultural meaning. So, going back to Bennett’s and Dickerson’s proposed question, why does society expect hair to have the same meaning through all cultures? The idea that all hair should be the same, look the same, and feel the same is oppressive to people outside of the Caucasian race. The oppression does not stop with Caucasian people forcing expectations on other race’s hairstyles, though. Even African American women are targeting other women of color by marketing beauty products to them, telling them that they should all play into this idea that their hairstyles should resemble white women’s hairstyles. This is a subconscious reinforcement of the oppression facing women of color (Bennett and Dickerson 283). This dilemma does not only apply to head hair though. There are standards for body hair just as much as for head hair. Our society is not accepting of women with armpit, leg, or pubic hair. These standards are extremely oppressive to women socially and economically. It is expensive to continually remove body hair or to continually get African American hair done so that it matches white women’s hair.
Adding onto the standards for women in the American society is the expectation that women’s bodies should be pure, smooth, and hairless. These characteristics all match the characteristics of a preadolescent girl. Adolescent and adult females are infantilized and taught by society to be submissive. It has become apparent that there are serious consequences to society valuing childlike traits in women. When women remove their body hair, including pubic hair, their bodies revert to looking preadolescent, inadvertently training men to be attracted to preadolescent female bodies. Robin Friebur bluntly states that there is a “link between hair removal and pedophilia” because “a man who is socialized to become erotically aroused by an infantilized woman may be primed to also become erotically aroused by children” (Friebur 38). This idea of the “ideal woman” being hairless is solidified by contemporary pornography (Bondy 27). Pornography is extremely accessible today and is widely accepted. Women are able to compare their own bodies to the women’s bodies in the pornography, and then emulate what they see: a hairless, childlike body (Bondy 27).
Beginning in the second wave of feminism, feminists started to boycott hair removal. Along with “bra burning” and the “Freedom Trashcan”, feminists fought back against the idea that women must shave. Feminists are often stereotyped as being fat, ugly, hairy lesbians. The second wave feminists are the reason “hairy” is added onto that stereotype. Ever since second wave feminists started growing their hair out, many other feminists have been inspired to do the same. Renee Bondy wrote an article called “Rhymes with Cubic Pear” and in it she said that she chose to grow her hair out for the purpose of the article. She said that “it’s hard to explain, but with hair on my body I felt stronger, bolder and bigger- like I took up a bit more space” (Bondy 29). Bondy has taken up the fight to defy the picture of the “ideal woman” that our society currently holds, that women must be small, take up little space, and be submissive.
There is a recurring theme among women who choose to boycott shaving for a specific reason, like how Bondy chose to stop shaving for her article or women who do it for a class or experiment. Most of these women go back to removing their hair as soon as the article is written and the class is over. If women want to prove that body hair removal should not be a social norm, then more women need to stand by it, permanently, because right now, it is easy to perceive women boycotting shaving as a one-time social experiment that’s just for fun. Tracy Moore sums this up this sentiment in an article called “400 Years of Women Removing their Body Hair.” She says:
“Like so many aspects of maintaining supposed femininity… I think it all comes down to doing what you feel comfortable doing… Although with stuff like this that’s so steeped in our very notion of femaleness, it becomes increasingly harder to pretend this is a choice ever made free of an utter barrage of influence in one (hairless) direction. And I think it’s really important to know that, and to empower women to move toward a definition of femininity that is less harmful to our psyche. And our actual vaginas” (Moore 4).
Within the past year, a trend has broken out among feminists. It all started when a hairstylist, Roxie Hunt, wanted to see if armpit hair could be dyed different colors. She convinced a friend to let her armpit hair be used for the experiment. Roxie posted a blog on a website called Offbeat Home about the entire experience. She explained in detail how she bleached and dyed her friend’s armpit hair blue. Roxie admitted that she didn’t believe the dye would actually stick to armpit hair, but she was pleasantly surprised when it did. In her blog she said “I felt a major win for body hair” (Hunt 1). After posting the experience on her blog, women all across the country began dyeing their armpit hair extravagant colors, too, sparking a trend.
As you can see, the practice of hair removal has been around for many thousands of years, contrary to American belief. It is also much more complicated than most people think. Many people argue that hair removal is no longer sexist, in America at least, because many men are being expected to remove their hair as well. However, this trend affects a much smaller portion of men, while virtually all women are expected to remove their hair. As reported in the article “Body Hair Removal,” the practice of depilatories and shaving reinforce the idea that the “woman’s body is unacceptable if left unaltered” (Toerien, Wilkinson, and Choi 400). Once again, the word unacceptable is presented, a common theme in the topic of hair. The American society places excesive standards on its women today. These standards are sexist and oppressive because not all women place the same value or meaning on their hair; some women place no meaning on it- and why should they? Hair is a natural occurrence on the male and female bodies. Women should not all be forced into one very small and restrictive box of hairlessness in order to be accepted. Women’s bodies, natural and unique, should be celebrated, not stripped and broken.
Works Cited
Bennett, Michael, and Vanessa D. Dickerson, eds. Recovering the Black Female Body. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2001. Print.
Bondy, Renee. “Rhymes with Cubic Pear.” Herizons Spring 2010: 25-29. Print.
Friebur, Robin. “Shaving is the Pits.” Off Our Backs May-June 2005: 37-38. Print.
Hunt, Roxie. “How to dye your armpit hair.” Offbeat Home & Life. FM Living. Web. 7 December 2014.
Knight, Eliza. “Historical Methods of Hair Removal.” History Undressed. Web. 7 December 2014.
Moore, Tracy. “400 Years of Women Removing their Body Hair.” Jezebel. Kinja. Web. 7 December 2014.
Toerien, Merran, Sue Wilkinson, and Precilla Y. L. Choi. “Body Hair Removal: The ‘Mundane’ Production of Normative Femininity.” Sex Roles March 2005: 399-406. Print.