Emma Dabiri is an academic, broadcaster and writer. She is a teaching fellow in the Africa Department at the School of Oriental and African Studies and is completing her Ph.D. in the sociology department at Goldsmiths. She is currently presenting Britains Lost Masterpieces on BBC4. Previous credits include Back in Time Brixton BBC2, Back in Time: The Sweetmakers BBC2 and Is Love Racist? Channel 4.
Her debut book A History of Hair will be published by Penguin in 2018.
Hairstyling is of great significance both in Africa and the African Diaspora. However, beyond considerations of style, and statements of resistance, black hair traditions provide a lens for examining social history, indigenous knowledge systems, and the spiritual and philosophical orientations of oral societies that were dismissed as lacking any such values.