Abstract
This chapter focuses on Puerto Rican woman and the intersection between race, hair, and the marketplace. More specifically, I provide a conceptual framework by which to examine how the dominant racial narrative is being disrupted on the island of Puerto Rico post-Hurricane Maria via the lens of hair. I interrogate the concept of hair systems (Candelario in Meridians, 1(1): 128–156, 2000), demonstrating how they have a greater impact on the marketplace than just hair product segregation and availability, and introduce the term hair regimes as a more accurate representation of the sociocultural implications of hair politics.
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Further Reading
Frank, R., Akresh, I. R., & Lu, B. (2010). Latino immigrants and the U.S. racial order how and where do they fit in? American Sociological Review, 75(3), 378–401.
Lugo-Lugo, C. R. (2012). “Ricky Martin ain’t no Dixie Chick”: Or, how we can learn a few things about citizenship and invisibility from popular culture. Centro Journal, 24(1), 68.
Landale, N. S., & Oropesa, R. S. (2002). White, black, or Puerto Rican? Racial self-identification among mainland and island Puerto Ricans. Social Forces, 81(1), 231–254.
Stayman, D. M., & Deshpande, R. (1989). Situational ethnicity and consumer behavior. Journal of Consumer Research, 16(3), 361–371.
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Vega-Centeno, J. (2019). “Dirty Braids”: How Hair Is Disrupting Dominant Racial Narratives in Puerto Rico Post-Hurricane Maria. In: Johnson, G., Thomas, K., Harrison, A., Grier, S. (eds) Race in the Marketplace. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11711-5_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11711-5_9
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