Southern Tease, the rate of hair growth across individuals and races varies greatly. So I don't think you can say that nearly everyone gets 1/2". I chat on forums with lots of naturals who minimally use combs and brushes and wear a lot of protective styles and even when they don't their hair isn't brushing against their shoulders cuz it's natural afro hair and that hair stands up and isn't brushing anything but air. Some grow/retain a lot, some don't. Most people here aren't saying their hair *can't* grow. In fact, I think the majority of the responses say that they think their hair grows around this .5 inch/month. But many others are simply saying that their hair grows more slowly. As for the books, I don't really pay much attention to anecdotal stories, I'd rather see statistical data and real lab research behind it. The last study I read on different hair rate growth across races did in fact show that on average black people grew it more slowly than white people who in turn grew it more slowly than Asian people. I'm not sure if it's true, probably there should be a lot more studies done, but until someone does a better study, I still think this is more indicative of the reality than people's anecdotes and personal reasonings of "this sounds like it would make sense to me." And if people believe such a study, I would hope that the self esteem of black people is not so intimately connected to how fast their hair comparatively grows that believing it would be some tragic admission or cause for despair.