A hairdressing salon in Paris, in May 2020. -

Lewis Joly

  • Thursday evening, the Prime Minister announced the establishment of a third containment in 16 French departments, to deal with the new outbreak of the coronavirus epidemic.

  • “Non-essential” businesses will have to lower the curtain for at least four weeks.

    With the exception of booksellers and record stores.

    And hairdressers.

  • Christian Bromberger, professor emeritus at the University of Aix-Marseille, returns for

    20 Minutes

    on this decision and on the meaning to be given to it vis-à-vis the French.

It's ok for a breath of fresh air.

And for a bowl cut.

Jean Castex announced this Thursday a new confinement in the 16 departments to face the new wave of coronavirus: if the inhabitants will be able to go out without limit of duration during the day, at the same time, the “non-essential” shops will, once again , "Lower the curtain" for at least four weeks.

All?

No.

Booksellers and record stores were not affected by these new restrictions as of Thursday evening.

And the government spokesman, Gabriel Attal, said on Friday on RTL that hairdressing salons would also be allowed to open.

A way of saying that just like eating food, going out in the open air or reading, hairstyle is also "essential" in the daily life of the French?

When it comes to hair, Christian Bromberger knows what he's talking about.

The ethnologist and professor emeritus at the University of Aix-Marseille is the author of

Senses du poil - Une anthropologie de la pilosity

(ed. Créaphis, 2015).

He responds to

20 minutes

.

Hairdressing salons will therefore remain open in the departments concerned by this third confinement, such as “essential” businesses.

Does this mean that they are "essential" to the life of the French?

Hair, body hair, fingernails, these are the only parts of the body that you can modify as you wish.

We can dye them, curl them, act on them.

But also “cheat” with it, by dyeing roots that turn white, going from blond to brown.

Through this, there is something unique about our hair: the possibility of changing its appearance.

However, leaving hairdressers open means allowing the French to have a grip on their appearance.

Part of the population does not care, but for the majority of them, it is very important.

Proof of this is, when you go to the hairdresser and listen to what people are saying when you go out, there is always a little disappointment: "Ah, the hairdresser missed me" ... "My bangs do not 'is not as it should be ”….

Because the image we have of ourselves is superior to reality.

Is the hairdressing salon a "business" like any other?

It is a very special place, because one of the few where you can do something for yourself.

Not for his children, for his family or his work, but only for oneself.

We can have topics of discussion that we generally do not address elsewhere.

Discussions about the body, pleasures, worries ...

In one year of the pandemic, and with the massive recourse to teleworking, has our relationship to appearance changed?

During previous confinements, two “solutions” appeared.

On the one hand, we let ourselves go, like retirees who let their beards grow.

Many people, in video, no longer paid much attention to their bodily appearance.

Whereas in ordinary social life, whether forced or voluntary, we are led to comb our hair, to maintain ourselves before appearing.

On the contrary, other people wanted to keep a good image of themselves, including being confined.

And that went through the maintenance of the hair

Can we see, in the non-closure of hairdressers, a desire for normality?

To show that the life before is still a bit there?

Thanks to this, there is more normality vis-à-vis the appearance that we want to give to ourselves and that we want to give to others.

It is a maintenance of normal life, but it raises the question of the essential and the non-essential.

The hairdresser is undoubtedly not essential in absolute terms, but it is socially.

We come back to this notion of the essential ...

It may seem ridiculous compared to the problems we know, compared to the disease that runs and kills.

But for the image of oneself, individually and collectively, we must see the importance that hairiness can have in our society.

Look at the men with their startup beards: they are groomed beards, not revolutionary beards.

They are as important as the female hairstyle or that of the young people.

Paris

Containment: Destination Lyon, Bordeaux or Rennes ... Heavy traffic in stations from Paris

Economy

Containment: The employers warn against the economic consequences of the reconfinement

  • Covid 19

  • Hairdressing

  • Confinement

  • Coronavirus

  • Society