Quannah Chasinghorse says Indigenous beauty is “missing in mainstream media”.
Quannah Chasinghorse believes its important to learn about Indigenous beauty
The John Paul Mitchell System ambassador - who is part of the Han Gwich’in and Oglala Lakota tribes - believes that Native culture has their “own beauty”.
The 20-year-old model told Allure magazine: “In the last two years, there have been a lot of Indigenous kids— very young kids — who are struggling with their appearance or identity. Because, like you said, there's so much missing in mainstream media. Native people, we don't meet those beauty standards. We have our own beauty.”
Quannah believes it's “important” to change the “narrative’ to stop ignorant comments that lead to a destruction of her community’s self esteem.
“A lot of young Native boys will want to cut their hair off because they get bullied or teased. In this one case two years ago, this little boy got bullied so badly that when he was in the bathroom, kids chopped off his braid. And so, having that representation, to tell these stories, to show them that this is normal, that boys and men can have long hair and be proud of it, and also represent their culture in a beautiful way… It’s so important to change that narrative so that our young kids don't have to worry about being bullied in school, or won't have to worry about covering up a part of themselves, or changing a part of themselves to fit that unrealistic beauty standard.”
The Vogue Mexico cover girl explained the meaning behind the many various “kinds of different hairstyles” from her culture and how they connect them to their past.
Quannah said: “For my people, in my culture and many Native American cultures, we’ve always had long hair and practiced different styles of braiding, or even had different styles of buns, and all kinds of different hairstyles.
“The three strands [of a braid] represent mind, body, and spirit. And when you're braiding, you're connecting your mind, body, and spirit, and you're connecting yourself to your ancestors, your wisdom because your hair carries all of the years of wisdom with you. And when someone passes away in your family or something tragic happens and you cut your hair out of grief, that's just cutting off that extra weight of the loss and the hurt and all of the years of knowing that person. That was a tactic of grief, cutting your hair and growing new hair for a new journey.”