HLONIPHA MOKOENA, Associate Professor at the Wits Institute for Social & Economic Research, University of the Witwatersrand “YOUR hair feels like pubic hair.” That was one of the first insults that someone hurled at my hair. She was a junior at my school. She would touch my hair and repeat this sentence to all present. I had to threaten her with violence to get her to stop touching my hair and comparing it to her pubes. This is one of the first dilemmas that black people face: do I let people touch my hair and under what circumstances? The question,…