So he soon falls in love with his new home and is happy there, except for one problem: he misses his liberty. James and Joe, his two successive grooms, were also quite caring and well-intentioned. John is his new coachman, and a good, wise, gentle old fellow. There he meets those who will become among his dearest friends: Ginger, Merrylegs, John Manly and James. Squire Gordon’s residence, Birtwick Park, thus becomes Beauty’s new home. He is sold to Squire Gordon, a man who takes a liking to this strong, young, beautifully dark coated horse.

After this coming-of-age training, he is ready to leave the meadow of his youth. Soon after, he must undergo the breaking-in process where his trainer gently teaches him to bear a rider, wear a saddle and bridle and respond to the rider’s driving signals. As his youngest days pass in that meadow, he witnesses the death of his own brother and a rider in a hunting accident.

The story of his life is this advice in living form. There, his mother nurtures him, raises him and gives him advice which he remembers and acts on for the rest of his life: do good and give your best effort always and everything will work out. Beauty in a Box uses an interdisciplinary framework, engaging with African American history, critical race and cultural theory, consumer culture theory, media studies, diasporic art history, black feminism, visual culture, film studies, and political economy to explore the history of black beauty culture in both Canada and the United States.The story begins in a meadow of 19th century England, where the young horse, Black Beauty, has just been born. The author explains the role local black community media has played in the promotion of African American–owned beauty products how the segmentation of beauty culture (i.e., the sale of black beauty products on store shelves labelled “ethnic hair care”) occurred in Canada and how black beauty culture, which was generally seen as a small niche market before the 1970s, entered Canada’s mainstream by way of department stores, drugstores, and big-box retailers.

The book analyzes advertisements and articles from media-newspapers, advertisements, television, and other sources-that focus on black communities in Halifax, Montreal, Toronto, and Calgary. One of the first transnational, feminist studies of Canada’s black beauty culture and the role that media, retail, and consumers have played in its development, Beauty in a Box widens our understanding of the politics of black hair. Download Beauty in a Box Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

Black beauty book pages