Today, many of us live in the most atomized societies in human history, which makes our lives less secure and undermines our ability to organize together to change unjust conditions on a large scale. We are put in competition with each other for survival, and we are forced to rely on hostile systems — like health care systems designed around profit, not keeping people healthy, or food and transportation systems that pollute the Earth and poison people — for the things we need. More and more people reportthat they have no one they can confide in. This means many of us do not get help with mental health, drug use, family violence or abuse until the police or courts are involved, which tends to escalate rather than resolve harm.
In this context of social isolation and forced dependency on hostile systems, mutual aid — where we choose to help each other out, share things, and put time and resources into caring for the most vulnerable — is a radical act.
Are you familiar with any other reliefs that depict hair similar to that worker? Its shape reminds me of "Afro-textured hair", which I guess might be of interest in the context of your other FAQ post touching on hair.
No, I don’t. Sadly I don’t possess an encyclopaedic knowledge of tomb paintings, even though I wish I did. And yes, that is a representation of afro textured hair. I am far from an expert in Ancient Egyptian hair, but I know both afro textured, and non textured hair was present in Ancient Egypt. I’m not sure which ask you’re referring to in my FAQ (there’s a lot in it and I can’t remember it all), but you may find this article interesting, this thesis (need to register to access but I think it’s free), and this article (starts at the bottom of page 7, but I warn for the use of outdated language) if you wanted to know more about studies done on Ancient Egyptian hair.
Hope it is okay to share these. I think some of them fit the bill. I’m sorry, I haven’t seen the other post yet.
These are eighteenth and nineteenth dynasty…
The only one that might is the relief of the person with their arm raised above their head, purely because they are likely to be a mourner and less likely to be in an idealised state. Even then, we have to be careful before stating one way or another as it’s not as simple as straight hair vs afro textured hair. Many Egyptians had curly hair that wasn’t necessarily afro textured. Determining it from a relief is extremely difficult, unless, like the image we were discussing originally, it is extremely obvious. Like so:
The others are still idealised portrayals of Egyptians, and it is not possible to know whether the hair depicted in these reliefs is in a natural state, or if it’s a wig, since we have examples of all these styles in both wigs and natural hair. Tomb paintings and reliefs are propaganda on the part of the tomb owner, and therefore will not necessarily reflect reality. Most of the time they absolutely do not, and merely reflect the fashions or trends of the time. The image anon is referring to (above) is markedly different to the images you’ve presented in that it portrays a workman with stubble and distinctly afro textured hair, a depiction that is closer to reality, whereas most these are idealised representations.
