Not only it’s exceptional but black beauty is diverse, as evidenced by the multitude of unions that are formed throughout the African continent and beyond, highlighting the black woman but especially the proliferation of events to its glory.
Already in 1957, in Congo Brazzaville, there was a beauty contest called “Miss AEF” and there was a dispute between the organizers as to whether the Congolese women competing should parade in African loincloths or in short dresses revealing their legs. This is probably one of the precursor facts reminding the relativity of female beauty.
With a certain experience, the organizers of female beauty contests have understood that it is difficult to put everyone in agreement on the criteria of beauty. Sometimes we remain stuck on Western canons, sometimes on others, qualified as African, for example, where we praise the curves of the woman or her typically African and natural features. Thus, the concepts have given the Congo “Miss Congo”, “Miss Independence”, “Miss Mama Kilo”, “Miss Fespam, “Miss Francophone”, “Miss Congo France”, “Miss Native”, etc..
So many words and concepts to magnify the beauty in Congo in particular but also in Africa and in the world in general.
It is clear that beauty is diverse and is appreciated relatively through the eyes of humans. The many juries that tried to decide between the beauties often contradicted each other, proof of the relativity of the notion of beauty. However, it has often been agreed worldwide that the black woman, not to say the black skin, is particularly beautiful. Let’s take the recent example, in 2014, of the Kenyan actress Lupita Nyong’o, elected most beautiful woman in the world, thus confirming that beauty can rhyme with black Africa, highlighting among the new generation, these countless conscious women who now embody the image of African beauty and who value their beautiful dark black skin.
In the Congo, we were naturally lulled, among others, by poets like the Senegalese Leopold Sedar Senghor in his poem “Black Woman” or the Guinean Camara Laye, through his work entitled “To my mother” in which he depicts the African woman as diverse, “woman of the fields, woman of the rivers, woman of the great river”.
The specificity of the recent contest “Miss Native” supports this statement and the selection criteria are not common, “height (1m40 minimum) and age (18 to 25 years)”, organized exclusively in the departments of the Congo where indigenous people are present.
We are moving away, we must be pleased, from these beauty canons where the African woman tended to identify with the Western woman, forgetting its original beauty canons, misled by the explosion of the media, Internet, Hollywood television series and the proliferation on the African markets of Western fashion magazines.
Without neglecting or ignoring the recurrent use of depigmentation products, it should be noted that we have gradually returned to that beautiful time when the African woman was proud of her beautiful ebony-black complexion glistening in the sun. Women from all walks of life are in demand, whether they are full-bodied, wiry or short, isn’t it said that all tastes are found in nature? They are all considered very beautiful and remain less and less complexed. The “modal colonialism” tends to disappear, we are free to note and admit it to ourselves, the natural African woman is the most beautiful!
