There have always been questions about dress in Jamaica. What is appropriate and what is not for what scenario. But the issue isn’t as simple as that. First, there were allegations a few weeks ago that Wolmer’s Boys’ School were not allowing boys to express themselves culturally through their hairstyles, and now a second school, almost as old, is being accused of being steeped in a tradition that represses the same 

Published July 9, 2021

Terrelonge locks horns with hair police

STATE MINISTER Alando-Terrelong has come out in support of black girls who wear Bantu knots, denouncing critics as self-haters.

“It is discriminatory and reeks of racial prejudices steeped in self-hate,” Terrelonge, the junior minister in the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, wrote on his Instagram page Thursday morning in relation to a controversial student hairstyle ban imposed by principal of Manning’s School, Steve Gordon.

The students were warned not to wear the Afrocentric hairstyle, also called ‘chiney bump’, for a photographic session that was part of their school-leaving exercise.

Terrelonge, who wears locks, revealed that he and his team have been working with stakeholders, including the Ministry of Education, and have now finalised a new National Grooming and Dress Code Policy. The document is to be submitted by Culture Minister Olivia Grange to Cabinet for approval.

“We must put an end to hair and other discriminatory practices in Jamaica. Our girls must be taught to embrace all their kinks and curls, and Manning’s, this is not it,” Terrelonge stated.

He lambasted public institutions, including schools, that have long imposed grooming codes that may conflict with climate and cultural and ethnic norms.

Regulations against the wearing of sleeveless garments have also been described as archaic and discriminatory.

Several past students with whom The Gleaner spoke said that the Manning’s ban on certain Afrocentric hairstyles was not a recent edict, as the principal may have suggested.

“The school certainly does not hold any biases against students of African descent or from any particular descent or religion. There is no basis for anyone to think, or to suggest, that this is so.

As an institution, the onus is on us to maintain a certain standard in dress code and deportment,” Gordon told The Gleaner.

He also said that recent correspondence about the hairstyle was based on presumed difficulties with the wearing of mortarboards.

“It was never about mortarboards because we don’t wear those to school daily. This school has always practised discrimination,” a past student, who requested anonymity, said.

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