Where do my curls come from?

September 7, 2006 7:57 PM

I'm constantly told I don't "look like" my ethnicity...do I?

I'm an Indian woman (ethnically--born here) , and have super curly, fine hair, not wavy, not slightly curly, but very curly. I also have small eyes, a little nose, and whatever else that often leads people to assume that I'm Hispanic, part black, or whatever else, and not Indian, which people usually associate with a curtain of dark hair,. huge eyes, and thin noses. I often get incredulous looks and a lot of " are you sure?" when I tell people I'm Indian, which is clearly ridiculous, and I often find myself gently telling people about stereotypes, etc, and also that my family comes from the Western coast, and the "typical" view of Indian people is actually more of a Northern look (in my opinion).

Nevertheless, where do my curls come from? I haven't noticed any other Indian women, ever, with hair like mine. I have a little English heritage, and no one in my family can tell me whether or not they had curly hair, but I'm a bit at a loss as to where I get this wild hair. Does anyone know of any group of Indians who has this hair, or are there Indians out there with this hair? It's also more brown than most Indian hair...

extra points for good comebacks for "you don't look Indian"

posted by sweetkid to society & culture (59 comments total)

You mention the Western coast. Is your family perhaps from Goa? Lots of Portuguese blood there. I have a Goan friend who has wonderful curly hair.

For extra points: "That's funny, you don't look like an insensitive clod!"
posted by trip and a half at 8:08 PM on September 7, 2006

"you don't look like anything to me, either"

Genes are weird things. If you have English heritage somewhere, you could easily end up with curly hair.
posted by devilsbrigade at 8:09 PM on September 7, 2006

my dad is from Bombay, and my mom is from Kohlapur (sp?) which is close to Goa....that's interesting.
posted by sweetkid at 8:10 PM on September 7, 2006

I am half Indian, my mom is from Shillong, which is in the Northeast, and she and I both have curly-ish hair, lighter skin, and are mistaken for hispanic all the time.
posted by harrumph at 8:40 PM on September 7, 2006

sweetkid - who ARE these people? why are they so rude? what business do they have to ask you whether you are sure of your heritage.

why, are they more sure than you, after meeting you a few moments earlier?

rude, rude, rude. No cute comebacks necessary - I would just stare at them for a few moments without any emotion in my face, and just walk away quietly with dignity.
posted by seawallrunner at 8:45 PM on September 7, 2006

FWIW, I had a friend at uni whose family were from Goa and she also had super super curly hair.

She had very dark chocolately skin too and occasionally people would assume she was from New Guinea or the Torres Strait and be surprised to find she was Indian.

Sorry, I don't know if she had any snappy comebacks tho'.
posted by t0astie at 8:52 PM on September 7, 2006

"...Come to think of it, you know, I'm not sure I am Indian, as I grew up in a vaccum with no cultural or linguistic input whatsoever."
posted by oflinkey at 9:24 PM on September 7, 2006

Central Asia (north and south) has a lot of genetic variability mostly due to various and sundry armies moving through over the centuries, raping as they went. In NorthWest India there's even some Greek genes running around left over from Alexander the Great's conquest.

There was also a fair amount of genetic mixing all over India during the British Rajh, I would venture to say.

You are what you are; you don't owe anyone any explanations and you are under no obligation to fulfill their racial stereotypes.
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 9:28 PM on September 7, 2006 [1 favorite]

My family's Sinhalese - so we're ethnically pretty "close" to Indians - and both my sisters have curly hair. As far as I know, we're ethnically "pure", too, without any European blood in the family at all.

"You don't look Indian."
"Yes, I do. This is what Indian looks like."
posted by bunglin jones at 9:29 PM on September 7, 2006

The next time someone asks what your ethnicity is, answer "American". And if they press you, tell them to get stuffed.
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 9:29 PM on September 7, 2006

extra points for good comebacks for "you don't look Indian"

"my parents didn't want me to grow up looking just like a billion other people"
posted by pyramid termite at 9:36 PM on September 7, 2006

I'm very typically jewish looking (curly dark hair, biggish nose, etc), and whenever it gets pointed out that I look really jewish (or, often, that I look really italian), I like to point out that my equally jewish mother has straight blond hair, blue eyes, and a nice straight jewish nose. You might find it useful to point out exceptions to expectations like that, or you might just let them simmer in their ignorance with something along the lines of "since when do all indians, or blacks, or whites all look the same?", followed by an eye roll.
posted by Kololo at 9:37 PM on September 7, 2006

Yah, my cousin who is sinhalese has super fine curly hair, which is a dark brown, a small nose, lightish skin, and a small nose and people don't often believe her when she says she's Sri-Lankan. She also has no European blood in the family.
posted by liquorice at 9:38 PM on September 7, 2006

"You don't look stupid ... yet here we are!"
posted by Lucie at 9:43 PM on September 7, 2006

"You don't look Indian."
"How?"
posted by rob511 at 9:52 PM on September 7, 2006

"You can tell because I have a thick skin and good manners."
posted by Phred182 at 10:05 PM on September 7, 2006

Why are people so sensitive about their ethnicity? Why is rude to inquire?
posted by iconjack at 10:09 PM on September 7, 2006

I don't think it is always rude to inquire, iconjack, but it is rude to insist that the person is wrong or that he/she doesn't "look" like his/her race.

I dislike asking about people's race. I often find out that if I wait long enough it will come out naturally.
posted by Monday at 10:19 PM on September 7, 2006

My great-grandfather swears he was Russian, but spoke German and had a lot of Jewish tendencies for a Lutheran. He looked Central Asian and claimed when he emigrated to Canada that he made the journey on foot (~1914). My dad looks the same, and sometimes passes for First Nations.

Me I look like my grandfather, fair-haired and blue-eyed. My mom's side is British, but all dark hair and brown eyes.

Genes are a tricky business. I've also noticed that going back a few generations, people have great powers of denial when it comes to occaisonal ancestors of different races especially when most of the family identifies with another or rival culture.

I used to be an international development worker, and once in a while I willl see someone who looks or sounds like they come from one of the regions I was posted in. I want to talk about the places so bad that I *almost* ask the "where are you from" question. My travels also made me quite good at figuring out dialects (accents), and when one stumps me, I almost can't resist asking (but I do).
posted by Deep Dish at 10:27 PM on September 7, 2006

It's not necessarily rude to inquire, but the person being asked would have had to answer the same question at least a bazillion times before, so I imagine it does get tiresome.

On preview, what Monday said.
posted by misozaki at 10:27 PM on September 7, 2006

"You don't look like an ignorant bastard, but I guess we shouldn't make assumptions on appreances, ay?"
posted by liquorice at 10:36 PM on September 7, 2006

The next time someone asks what your ethnicity is, answer "American". And if they press you, tell them to get stuffed.
posted by Steven C. Den Beste

SweetKid, I am often in such a situation. My mum is Sri Lankan born, with Portugese and Dutch roots. My dad is 100% fair dinkum Australian. People ask me what my ethnicity is, I reply Australian. When they say I don't look it i reply that I'm Australian because that is where I have been born and have lived my entire life. I look fairly Sri Lankan (dark olive skin and dark brown hair), but when I was working in a shop I would get people come up to me speaking Indian, Arabic and a myriad of other things. It offended me to begin with, but I just strated to tell people that I am Australian and I have no idea what they're saying. On the flip side, I tell people I'm part Sri Lankan and they often don't believe me.
posted by cholly at 11:35 PM on September 7, 2006

One semi-serious comeback for "you don't look Indian" would just be "India's a big place, buddy" with an implied side order of "...and you obviously don't know much about it".

As we can see from all these replies, it encompasses so many variations in culture and history, colonisation and race, you might as well say "you don't look European".

So maybe you should say "I don't look Indian? Well, do you look American?"

P.S. Love "born here". You were born on the Internet?
posted by AmbroseChapel at 12:09 AM on September 8, 2006

My boyfriend is Gujarati (North Indian). It's unlikely that he has any European ancestors, but his surname indicates some Mughal heritage. He has what some people call a "cafe au lait" complexion and very ethnically ambiguous features.

It's not uncommon for people to speak to him in Spanish because they think he's "Mexican" or Hispanic. He's also mistaken for Arab because of the combination of his surname and his appearance. He could blend in with the locals pretty much anywhere from Brazil to Greece to Iran to Morocco.

Also: my roommate is Guyanese, of Indian descent (her grandparents emigrated from Delhi to Guyana many years ago). She has quite curly hair when she leaves it in its natural state.
posted by anjamu at 1:01 AM on September 8, 2006

I was thinking about this and I reckon you ought to say "I'm from the part of India where people look like me".

This may not work for the truly stupid, who will just say "huh?".
posted by AmbroseChapel at 3:22 AM on September 8, 2006

My mum is Bangladeshi (I'm not sure how near she was to your relatives) and she's got really curly hair, so does her sister. My hair's kinda wavy from that (Dad, who is also Bangladeshi, has straight hair).

I've seen South Asian people with curly hair, it's not as rare as people may assume...
posted by divabat at 4:13 AM on September 8, 2006

I have a friend who's Indian (from, I believe, Chennai or thereabouts) and has very curly hair.
posted by srah at 4:16 AM on September 8, 2006

"you don't look white either" ?
posted by badlydubbedboy at 5:03 AM on September 8, 2006

My mother is South Asian and my father was Italian/Spanish. When people learn this they ALWAYS think my *mother*'s the Italian one - she has white skin, high cheekbones and curly brown hair. She doesn't have a drop of European blood in her.

People think I'm different things in different lights. Some people think I look typically Indian; other people swear I'm Spanish. I'm asked "Where are you from?" on weekly basis by people I meet; people I stand in line behind; people in the supermarket.

I'm no anthropologist, but I know South Asians are a mixed bunch. As far as I understand, there are the indigenes from the south, the Persian invaders ("Northern" Indians) from the north, and a bunch of others in between. Bengalis look very different from Punjabis who look very different from Tamils... you could have almost anything in your genetic history.

So if people say "You don't look Indian" you could either spout some of that at them (probably should look it up, as I am most probably wrong about some of it), or say "And you don't look stupid. You can never tell, I guess."
posted by unmusic at 5:14 AM on September 8, 2006

"Yes, I do. This is what Indian looks like."

I think this is the ideal answer. (Enough with the snappy insults -- they weren't helpful to begin with, and now they're just repetitive.)

My great-grandfather swears he was Russian, but spoke German and had a lot of Jewish tendencies for a Lutheran.

Off-topic, but: was he from the Baltic region? The cities of what's now Estonia and Latvia were basically German, with significant Jewish minorities, and of course were part of Russia until the Revolution.
posted by languagehat at 5:37 AM on September 8, 2006

Damn there are a lot of dumb people out there. I have had similar problems as a very tall pale-skinned green-eyed Jew. The one cool thing is that I enjoy it when everyone assumes that I belong to "their" ethnic group-- people have thoughts I am Irish Catholic, Turkish, and all sorts of other things.

To your second question, though, often people want to "debate" whether I am really Jewish, especially when they learn that my family doesn't keep kosher or anything. I always say "would you like to sit down for an hour and learn about the history of my people?" if I am in a good mood, or "have you ever heard of rape?" if I am in a bad mood. (It is a fact that there was a rape (eastern Europe) a few generations back-- no idea if that contributed to my family "look" but it certainly muddies the waters.)
posted by miss tea at 5:44 AM on September 8, 2006

I'm with AmbroseChapel. "India's a big place" isn't exactly rude, but it does firmly remind your questioner that he isn't such an expert as he thinks.
posted by nebulawindphone at 5:52 AM on September 8, 2006

Another vote for "India's a big place." Or just "Western Coast." Any further rudeness just gets the quizzical WTF look.

We whiter-than-white folks get this ridiculousness, too. I've had people argue with me that I must be Irish. Because my hair is red. It's dyed. I'm Polish.
posted by desuetude at 6:07 AM on September 8, 2006

To questioners who reply to the effect that you don't look Indian, you might retort that "Evidently my forebears led interesting lives".

The "melting pot" has reduced our sensitivity to asking such questions and I suspect that they are born of a genuine curiosity rather than as a put down. A remark to the effect that "You don't look Indian" may, indeed, be a frank admission of the asker's ignorance on the subject and a clumsy attempt to open the dialogue further. Even if this were not true, by adopting that assumption you could find yourself opening a door to an interesting exchange.
posted by RMALCOLM at 6:09 AM on September 8, 2006

As regards the curls, I've had the exact opposite experience. I'm half black and half Italian, so I get a lot of people thinking I'm whatever ethnicity they are, and when I went to high school with lots of Indians, everyone thought I too was Indian. So people who say you aren't a morons as discussed above.

As for asking people their ethnicity: if you get asked all the freakin time, it gets annoying. At least that's why I don't like it. Besides, if you get to know me for any time at all, I'll tell you.
posted by dame at 6:28 AM on September 8, 2006

I think you should act really horrified and then say "Oh my god! You're right! My parents have been lying to me all these years! Maybe they're not even my parents!" Then burst into tears and run from the room.

Perhaps they'll think a little more the next time. :)
posted by witchstone at 6:43 AM on September 8, 2006

Hi Sweetkid,

My girlfriend is Indian, Gujurati (Shah), pure-bred [all indian hertiage as far as I could trace back -- 6 generations]. She too has extremely curly hair, which is brown-black, almost golden in some places.

Depending on her hairstyle, make-up and clothes she can master looks from old school gujurati to latino.

I don't know if this helps, but just so you know -- you're not alone :) -- maybe it's something in the Indian gene-pool.
posted by gadha at 7:12 AM on September 8, 2006

I'm like anjamu's boyfriend -- Gujarati, with thick curly hair (but I straighten it) -- I'm often mistaken for middle eastern or hispanic (living in texas was a real pain, I don't speak ANY spanish). Someone even once asked if I was Armenian. My brother, with his pale skin and big nose gets mistaken for Greek all the time. So my family feels your pain :-)

Oh, also, I now have TWO punjabi friends with pale skin and red hair. They look irish. They're also not related.
posted by echo0720 at 7:20 AM on September 8, 2006

So, your question got me thinking and I just had a short conversation with her.

Turns out, apparently, a *lot* of people in the state of Gujurat have curly hair. In her words "it's not unusual at all". Also, she says brown-black hair is a lot more common than the usual jet-black.

Maybe that's a starting point you could work with.
posted by gadha at 7:22 AM on September 8, 2006

Thanks for the answers, and sorry for the US-centric comment in my post. Yes "born here"= the US, not the internet. :)
posted by sweetkid at 7:46 AM on September 8, 2006

Oh, and my family is from Maharashtra, which is between Gujarat and Goa, which were both mentioned as curly places in this thread. So I guess I am not all that uncommon, which makes me feel pretty awesome. Thanks AskMe, for cultural affirmation.
posted by sweetkid at 7:47 AM on September 8, 2006

Why all the mean retorts? Those who are confused are likely just curious about her background. I'm amused by AmbroseChapel's suggestion. It gets the point across by being clever instead of indignant.
posted by umlaut at 7:52 AM on September 8, 2006

I see plenty of reason for rude retorts when someone doubts your origins to your face. Rudeness begets rudeness.

Don't let them get away with it - it's wrong and frequently betrays some racism as well - you don't look how they want to pigeonhole you.
posted by agregoli at 8:17 AM on September 8, 2006

Just chiming in: pure-bred Punjabi here (which means heavily mixed with every Indian invader ever, as far as I can tell), with uncontrollable curly hair. I get mistaken for every ethnicity under the sun, yet still get told by Indians that I look very "classical Indian" (whatever that means). Personally, I always associated the stick-straight sheet of jet-black hair with South Indians or girls with hair straighteners. And I agree that the comments along the lines of "India's a big place" and "This is what an Indian looks like" are great. And true.
posted by sa3z at 8:26 AM on September 8, 2006

Phearlez's razor stipulates that when you are boggled as to why someone would do such a stupid thing, the likely answer is that it's because they're an idiot. Quipping rudely back at these folk is deliberately rude where they may simply be accidentally rude.

Maybe they are simply poor communicators and say "you don't look Indian" when they mean "I am surprised; you do not have the characteristics that I associate with being Indian." Shrug and say "well, I am pretty certain about my ethnicity" if you're not in the mood for a dialog or take the opportunity to have a conversation with someone clearly interested in the subject of race and appearance if you are.

A very smart women once told me that when she's presented with a statement from someone that she can take as a compliment or as an insult that she always chooses the compliment - being insulted has never made her happier but being complimented almost always does.
posted by phearlez at 8:57 AM on September 8, 2006 [2 favorites]

i'll nth support for the "yes, i do. this is what indian looks like" answer. i really like that. i'll use variations of it to reply to the "you don't talk/act like a black person" comments i occasionally get.

i'd also add that situations like this are an opportunity for you to question any and all assumptions you make about other people based on their appearances. i've started doing that whenever i get comments and questions like you've been getting, and i've had to give myself figurative kicks in the boo-tay for some of the stupid thoughts i've had about others.
posted by lord_wolf at 9:31 AM on September 8, 2006

My best friend has super curly, black hair and she's from Kerala. She always gets mistaken for hispanic, and I think that's common.

The weirdest thing happened to me, in terms of ethnicity, as well as accent. This guy I was working with, an older black man, sheepishly started asking me "Where are you from?" and then later, "Did you go to college?" And I was confused at what he was getting at, but I said that I'm from Chicago and did go to college. He said to me, "Because, you don't talk like regular people." Only then did he ask me my ethnicity, and I said I was mixed. "Oh! That's it," he said. "Because when you called me on the phone I was like, this girl talks white! [Your voice is] very disguisin'." I guess what he meant was that he thought I was black or latina.

So that was a roundabout way of asking my ethnicity. I've gotten this question all my life and I do prefer if people ask me straight out, because we should be interested in each other. I love talking about my heritage.
posted by scazza at 9:38 AM on September 8, 2006

See also...
posted by sad_otter at 9:56 AM on September 8, 2006

So much of the asking has to do with tone - it's very clear when someone is being insulting - particularly when it's said as rudely and beligerently as "What ARE you?"
posted by canine epigram at 10:45 AM on September 8, 2006

I was born in the US. My mother, sister, and I all have super curly hair, especially my sister. My parents are from Tamil Nadu and are ethnically Telugu people. Also, my mother and I have sort of reddish-dark brown hair, definitely not black. I tried dyeing my hair black once, and it was awful.

I think you're right about people picturing a North Indian when they think Indian. I usually say something along the lines of Ambrose's answer that India's a big and varied country. (Also when answering the "what are you?" or "where are you from?" questions, I usually say I'm an American, from Florida -- I think people should ask what they are really thinking, "why are you brown?")
posted by bluefly at 11:30 AM on September 8, 2006

iconjack: Why are people so sensitive about their ethnicity? Why is rude to inquire?

Related.
posted by cybercoitus interruptus at 12:10 PM on September 8, 2006

The other day in an elevator a guy at work asked me (straight out, without saying hello or anything, "WHERE ARE YOU FROM?"

I said the seventh floor.

I agree that rudeness begets rudeness. Out-of-left-fielders confounds idiots for a second or two, giving you time to get away.

It is tiring to constantly be asked where you're from though.
posted by unmusic at 12:34 PM on September 8, 2006

*Close bracket*
posted by unmusic at 12:34 PM on September 8, 2006

My response when one says similar things to me (usually about age) is "OK" and move right along wirth whatever was being discussed before. If they insist on resurfacing the issue play it by ear depending on the person, your mood and the social context--much different with a clerk who is collecting information for an application versus a dinner with friends/new acquaintances and several glasses of wine.
posted by rmhsinc at 12:37 PM on September 8, 2006

I'm with a lot of people who say being asked isn't usually offensive, but the "you don't look..." is. It implies that they think they know more about your ethnicity than you do. Obviously it's completely subconscious, but that still seems to be the implication.

Of course, I don't get asked that often. And the only person to come close to that comment was sure I must be Scandinavian - gotta love that Celtic bone-white skin.
posted by timepiece at 2:31 PM on September 8, 2006

It implies that they think they know more about your ethnicity than you do. Obviously it's completely subconscious, but that still seems to be the implication.

I don't think that this implication is obviously, completely, or subconscious. What's subconscious about arguing with someone over what ethnicity they are or appear to be?
posted by desuetude at 3:09 PM on September 8, 2006

I'm Indian (my family is from Gujarat) and I have straight black in no way curly hair. Even so, I'm mistaken for Hispanic. They just assume I'm Hispanic. Some people, particularly from the Middle East or people who have had contact with Indian people at some point in their lives, right away recognize my ethnicity.
posted by onepapertiger at 12:30 PM on September 9, 2006

Oh, I forgot to mention: My cousin and his wife (both Guju, both full-blooded Indian & both straight haired) had a son born with curly hair! He still has very curly hair. Who knows where it comes from.
posted by onepapertiger at 12:34 PM on September 9, 2006

I don't think that this implication is obviously, completely, or subconscious.

Well, you're right. I think I was trying to put the best spin on why someone would do that.

But to me, it still implies, "I know more about your background than you do - you must be misinformed. Someone has not told you about your Hispanic great-grandfather/Irish grandmother/black g-g-whatever/etc., but since I can tell just by looking at you that you have one, I'm going to tell you now."

As someone else said, genes are funny things, and stereotypes do not cover every variation of ethnicity. Most people are fully aware of their ethnic background (excluding adoptees, and people whose families have covered up rapes/infidelities/etc.), so trying to tell them they aren't of the background they think is pretty pointless and arrogant.
posted by timepiece at 9:56 AM on September 11, 2006