Jun 25, 2021
There's a history to this. I found out, through Isabelle Allende's novel, Island Beneath the Sea, that in late 18th Century New Orleans, there was a law that women of color could not wear a hat, jewels, or showy clothes in public. "The result" according to Allende, was that "mulattas adorned themselves in their tignons with such charm that they surpassed the finest hat from Paris." According to Wikipedia, while the tignon law was supposed to be a mark of inferiority, those against whom it was directed turned it into a fashion protest.
