Sorghum Braids, 2025

Braiding performance and spoken narration. Sorghum-dyed cotton rope, ceramic hair barrettes, and ceramic combs.

Sorghum is a grain native to Africa, likely introduced to the Americas through the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. Found growing on plantations in the Antebellum South, sorghum is one of the goods believed to have been carried by enslaved Africans on their forced migration to the Americas. It is speculated that hair braiding may have been used at the time to conceal and safeguard seeds and grains. Sorghum Braids connects the act of braiding to agricultural legacies and “official” and speculative accounts of history.