Girl's perspective on keeping short hair in school

Master's Thesis from the year 2018 in the subject Cultural Studies - Miscellaneous, grade: B+, Ghana Institute of Journalism, course: MA Development Communication, language: English, abstract: A woman's hair is said to be her crowning glory, yet girls in Government operated junior and senior high schools in Ghana are not permitted to wear their (natural) hair long. The strict hair rule for young girls in school is that it must be kept short. This policy applies to only Ghanaian girls and does not extend to their Caucasian classmates. This research investigates the views, opinions, attitudes and feelings of young girls in senior high school in Accra. The quantitative method was used in conducting the research and thus the research tool employed in gathering the data was a self-administering questionnaire distributed to 60 respondents. In analyzing the data, both the qualitative and quantitative data analysis procedures were used. The research found that many girls are aware of the official reasons authorities cite for not permitting long hair to be worn to school and although a very tiny percentage of the respondents agree with the short hair policy, the majority of respondents do not. Overall, respondents expressed negative feelings about themselves as a result of not being permitted to grow their hair. The recommendation therefore is that young girls in Ghana should be permitted to wear their natural hair long to school, in basic hairstyles such as a ponytails and cornrows.