tammiematthews
New Member
I hope this link works. I'll be looking forward to here from you ladies http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/news_columnists/article/0,1426,MCA_646_4253650,00.htm
But if not...here's the article:
Thomas: Whose tradition?
Ballet teacher rejects charge's locked hair
By Wendi C. Thomas
Contact
November 20, 2005
For two months, Destini Berry, 7, has been studying classical ballet. Her first recital would have been Dec. 12.
But because Destini wears her hair in dreadlocks, Dance Works director Karen Zissoff has barred the girl from performing.
Zissoff's dress code requires girls to pull their hair back into a bun for performances. No braids or bangs allowed.
Destini doesn't have braids or bangs; she has locks, as they're commonly called.
Destini's shoulder-length locks are a bit thicker than spaghetti. And, as mom Takeisha Berry, who is a natural hair stylist, showed Zissoff, they can be put into a secure bun.
Zissoff saw the bun and pronounced it unacceptable.
"Classical ballet dancers do not have locks," said Zissoff, who teaches from the rigorous Royal Academy of Dance syllabus.
As you might imagine, Berry is frustrated. Frustrated that Zissoff didn't mention that Destini's hair would be an issue when she first signed up.
Frustrated that Zissoff, who is white, doesn't get the difference between braids, which can be removed, and locks, which cannot, even though she's taught black girls for 18 years.
Berry enrolled Destini in ballet so her daughter could learn about posture and position -- and she has.
But she's also getting her first hard lesson in how authority figures who prefer a European look act when nonconforming black folk arrive.
The tension between ethnic hair styles in traditionally staid environs is not unique to Zissoff's dance studio.
Similar conflicts have sparked a natural black hair movement, which grows stronger every time a workplace or a school tries to ban braids or locks and finds itself on the losing side of a discrimination lawsuit.
Zissoff shrugs off the possibility that she's violated state and federal guidelines that prohibit race-based discrimination by a nonprofit organization, like Dance Works, that receives government funds.
As she sees it, Destini has three options. She can quit the program at Southwest Tennessee Community College. She can cut off her hair and join the recital. Or she can keep her locks and perform alone Dec. 11 for her parents.
Zissoff insists, "This is not an issue of culture, this is an issue of tradition." To back her up, she had Anita Alston, who is black, sit in on our interview.
When I asked Zissoff if she understood what locks are, she pointed to Alston, whose daughter is in Dance Works. "She's the expert on hair."
Alston, who is not a hair stylist, does not teach dance, and who wears her hair chemically straightened as I do, answered several of the questions I posed to Zissoff, who was emotionless during our 45-minute chat. Alston, who is Berry's cousin, agreed with Zissoff -- Destini should conform or leave.
But several other local and national performing arts experts said Zissoff's rigidity has more to do with her personal biases than her professed devotion to the high standards of the art.
"I'm concerned about the imposition of a cultural bias," said Bennie Nelson West of the Memphis Black Arts Alliance. "I don't want to say (Zissoff) shouldn't have her standards, but standards don't mean subjugating who you are."
Said Ronald Alexander, the director of Dance Theatre of Harlem's school: "Whether it's straight or braided or whatever texture, there is a way where the hair can be put into a classical bun."
If the highly respected DTH allows braids and locks, Alexander sees no reason why Zissoff shouldn't.
When it comes to her hair rules, Zissoff, who has said her program encourages "cultural diversity and awareness," is doing a sad solo.
The policy at Ballet Memphis, the Memphis Performing Arts Center, the New Ballet Ensemble, the Memphis Black Arts Alliance and Ballet on Wheels, as well as the renowned Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, is the same: If the girl's hair is secured away from her face, preferably in a bun, the show will go on.
"I'm so amazed that someone would bar a child because of her hair," said Emma Crystal, a dance teacher for the Memphis Performing Arts Center. "I thought that went out with the '60s. ... A big part of performing arts is about self-empowerment, pulling out the best in you, not the best hairdo in you."
Said Dorothy Gunther Pugh of Ballet Memphis: "If their dreads are secured so that they won't hurt their eyes when they spin, then it's fine."
Destini, a first-grader at St. Agnes Academy, says she loves her hair. "It's so beautiful and my mom did it for me."
Still, her mom worries that this incident may have lasting effects. "I've been teaching her to love herself as she is," Berry said, "but she's to the point now where she doesn't want to go (to class) anymore."
Is Zissoff concerned about how this might affect Destini's self-image?
"No," she said flatly. "They're here to conform to all the dance training standards."
Zissoff insisted that allowing Destini to perform with her locks would send a confusing message to her other students, and worse, would be disrespectful to the art form.
But it's not ballet that's being disrespected here, Berry said, and she's absolutely right.
Here we have a professional who works with black children and is almost proud of her willful ignorance about the culture of the students she teaches. That's the biggest dis of all.
Said Destini's mom: "If you're going to deal with African-American girls in our culture, then this is something you'll have to respect, just as you want us to come into your program with respect."
Below should be a picture of Destini in her ballet bun (locked)
javascript
opup('http://mas.scripps.com/MCA/2005/11/19/e20wendi1_e.jpg',350,450)
But if not...here's the article:
Thomas: Whose tradition?
Ballet teacher rejects charge's locked hair
By Wendi C. Thomas
Contact
November 20, 2005
For two months, Destini Berry, 7, has been studying classical ballet. Her first recital would have been Dec. 12.
But because Destini wears her hair in dreadlocks, Dance Works director Karen Zissoff has barred the girl from performing.
Zissoff's dress code requires girls to pull their hair back into a bun for performances. No braids or bangs allowed.
Destini doesn't have braids or bangs; she has locks, as they're commonly called.
Destini's shoulder-length locks are a bit thicker than spaghetti. And, as mom Takeisha Berry, who is a natural hair stylist, showed Zissoff, they can be put into a secure bun.
Zissoff saw the bun and pronounced it unacceptable.
"Classical ballet dancers do not have locks," said Zissoff, who teaches from the rigorous Royal Academy of Dance syllabus.
As you might imagine, Berry is frustrated. Frustrated that Zissoff didn't mention that Destini's hair would be an issue when she first signed up.
Frustrated that Zissoff, who is white, doesn't get the difference between braids, which can be removed, and locks, which cannot, even though she's taught black girls for 18 years.
Berry enrolled Destini in ballet so her daughter could learn about posture and position -- and she has.
But she's also getting her first hard lesson in how authority figures who prefer a European look act when nonconforming black folk arrive.
The tension between ethnic hair styles in traditionally staid environs is not unique to Zissoff's dance studio.
Similar conflicts have sparked a natural black hair movement, which grows stronger every time a workplace or a school tries to ban braids or locks and finds itself on the losing side of a discrimination lawsuit.
Zissoff shrugs off the possibility that she's violated state and federal guidelines that prohibit race-based discrimination by a nonprofit organization, like Dance Works, that receives government funds.
As she sees it, Destini has three options. She can quit the program at Southwest Tennessee Community College. She can cut off her hair and join the recital. Or she can keep her locks and perform alone Dec. 11 for her parents.
Zissoff insists, "This is not an issue of culture, this is an issue of tradition." To back her up, she had Anita Alston, who is black, sit in on our interview.
When I asked Zissoff if she understood what locks are, she pointed to Alston, whose daughter is in Dance Works. "She's the expert on hair."
Alston, who is not a hair stylist, does not teach dance, and who wears her hair chemically straightened as I do, answered several of the questions I posed to Zissoff, who was emotionless during our 45-minute chat. Alston, who is Berry's cousin, agreed with Zissoff -- Destini should conform or leave.
But several other local and national performing arts experts said Zissoff's rigidity has more to do with her personal biases than her professed devotion to the high standards of the art.
"I'm concerned about the imposition of a cultural bias," said Bennie Nelson West of the Memphis Black Arts Alliance. "I don't want to say (Zissoff) shouldn't have her standards, but standards don't mean subjugating who you are."
Said Ronald Alexander, the director of Dance Theatre of Harlem's school: "Whether it's straight or braided or whatever texture, there is a way where the hair can be put into a classical bun."
If the highly respected DTH allows braids and locks, Alexander sees no reason why Zissoff shouldn't.
When it comes to her hair rules, Zissoff, who has said her program encourages "cultural diversity and awareness," is doing a sad solo.
The policy at Ballet Memphis, the Memphis Performing Arts Center, the New Ballet Ensemble, the Memphis Black Arts Alliance and Ballet on Wheels, as well as the renowned Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, is the same: If the girl's hair is secured away from her face, preferably in a bun, the show will go on.
"I'm so amazed that someone would bar a child because of her hair," said Emma Crystal, a dance teacher for the Memphis Performing Arts Center. "I thought that went out with the '60s. ... A big part of performing arts is about self-empowerment, pulling out the best in you, not the best hairdo in you."
Said Dorothy Gunther Pugh of Ballet Memphis: "If their dreads are secured so that they won't hurt their eyes when they spin, then it's fine."
Destini, a first-grader at St. Agnes Academy, says she loves her hair. "It's so beautiful and my mom did it for me."
Still, her mom worries that this incident may have lasting effects. "I've been teaching her to love herself as she is," Berry said, "but she's to the point now where she doesn't want to go (to class) anymore."
Is Zissoff concerned about how this might affect Destini's self-image?
"No," she said flatly. "They're here to conform to all the dance training standards."
Zissoff insisted that allowing Destini to perform with her locks would send a confusing message to her other students, and worse, would be disrespectful to the art form.
But it's not ballet that's being disrespected here, Berry said, and she's absolutely right.
Here we have a professional who works with black children and is almost proud of her willful ignorance about the culture of the students she teaches. That's the biggest dis of all.
Said Destini's mom: "If you're going to deal with African-American girls in our culture, then this is something you'll have to respect, just as you want us to come into your program with respect."
Below should be a picture of Destini in her ballet bun (locked)
javascript
opup('http://mas.scripps.com/MCA/2005/11/19/e20wendi1_e.jpg',350,450)
