The month of October lines up with so many annual events that the “dark ladies” of the world really stan: Halloween, Dia de los Muertos, All Saints’ Eve, you name it. And as the astrological weather changes from lush Libra season to seductive Scorpio season, Many Black people in the diaspora are also celebrating the beauty within Hoodoo Heritage Month!
Hoodoo is a spiritual tradition of West African people who came to the Americas in the middle passage. As marginalized people began to share communities, Hoodoos created new traditions, customs, and spiritual systems that made sense on foreign land, mixing customs from their homeland with those of Indigenous people and poor immigrants who introduced Christian traditions.
For centuries, the folk spirituality of Black people in America have been demonized, labelling many as “witches” and “devil worshipers,” since they misunderstood and feared the power of our traditional ways of knowing. However, in recent years, many young Black people, especially those with roots in the south, have come to reclaim the largely lost traditions of their ancestors, embracing hoodoo and other African traditional spiritual systems as their root.
Hoodoo is recognized, validated, and celebrated in the Black mainstream now more than ever. Many refer to Annie in the hit movie Sinners as a hoodoo, fixing roots while donning her belt of talismans and herb-filled satchels. The global mainstream, as is typical with Black counterculture, has even begun to embrace hoodoo as “witchiness,” or a pagan occult aesthetic (though we do not relate; Black people in the tradition are crystal-clear on hoodoo’s sacred Afro-Indigenous roots).
When many think of witches, they think of ugly, long nosed, pimple ridden white women in cloaks who bend over cauldrons to hex their muggle subjects. Contrarily, especially as hoodoo has been used as a survival tool for Black women navigating systems of oppression, beauty rituals are integral to the tradition.
Below, I whisper a few hoodoo secrets. Read closely.
Go Back to Your Roots (Literally)
One of the simplest markers of hoodoo is its use of the earth to conjure natural beauty and wellness. The tradition relies heavily on “rootwork,” a word that makes many jump, but a practice that is more therapeutic than most people think. Natural plants and herbs contain properties so magical that even the science community is keyed into their abundant effects (though extremely late, compared to our ancient knowledge)!
For example, as a young dancer, I struggled with severe eczema on my arms and legs and my mother spent so much money experimenting with creams and topicals that all barely worked. It wasn’t until my West African dance teacher, our now beloved community ancestor Mama Niambi, pulled me aside with concern for how much I’d scratch my arms in her class. She recommended an aloe leaf, instructing me to blend its pulp and let it dry on my skin nightly. I’ve not had issues with eczema since.
Note: Make sure you are well informed on the properties you put on or in your body! Experimenting with plants can get risky if you’re not familiar with its allergen and toxin content.
Butters, Oils, and Waters
To that end, naturally occurring oils and waters are staples for beauty on both a hoodoo’s vanity and in their kitchens! Many are multipurpose, mundane items that can be used on the body and even in your diet.
When I think of a root that is used in many oils, butters, and waters for beauty and glamour rituals, I think of roses. From Beauty and the Beast to The Bachelor franchise, roses have long been mainstream symbols of beauty and youth. Many hoodoos have always known why; they actually carry beautifying magic within them. Chemically, roses hold powerful antioxidants that neutralize free radicals that damage collagen and speed the aging process.
So there is no wonder why rose waters, rose butters, and rosehip oils are staples in the homes of hoodoos. Personally, I love making rose waters, picking up rosehip oils from my local beauty supply, and trusting my good friend’s online shop, practitioner Nikki Buchanan’s Soul Things Botanica, to hook me up with the lightest, sweetest rose butter I’ve ever worn!
The Bath of Milk and Honey
Water and other liquids are the most accessible natural resource to work simple beauty and wellness magic with. Water is generally a very feminine, mutable element that naturally beautifies everything it pours itself into, from lakes and rivers to our very bodies. Baths always make me feel super lush and glamorous, even with water and a little fragrant froth on top. Getting intentional with baths is what turns a mundane act of care into a beauty ritual, and that is in part tied to other magical elements that I pour into them.
Enter: milk and honey! Glamour baths with milk and honey is one of the longest-kept beauty secrets for Black women in the tradition. One of my favorite writers, Ntozake Shange, would swear by milk and honey baths (in the way only a renowned Venusian Libra would!) as a ritual that inspired her beauty and her art. Chemically, the lactic acids in milk gently remove dull skin while honey kills bacteria and seals in hydration. The silky pair integrates sweetness and care that have real effects on restoring and softening the body and mind.
Paint the Town Red!
One of the simplest rituals of adornment in hoodoo traditions is our use of color! Colors and patterns have very specific meanings in hoodoo. When you endow yourself with color, like when wearing makeup and nails with intention, you are choosing to alchemize and embody the essence of your energy!
Where hoodoo-coded feminine adornment is concerned, the color red comes to mind. Many of my elders and ancestors (as well as many of yours, I’m sure) swore by a red lip-and-full-set combo! For Black women, that color has always carried a potent power that signals sensuality, seduction, and even softness. Personally, I think a red lip and a red nail is an ancestral marker of a woman who generally holds some power and is not to be messed with!