Kitchen Neck Hair

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Mary, and I’m calling from Kenai, Alaska.

I adopted four African-American girls several years ago,

And then one of my daughters went on to have a baby,

And I was combing my granddaughter’s hair one day,

And she said to me, don’t mess with my kitchen.

And I said, what do you mean your kitchen?

And then she pointed to the back of her hair

Where the nape of her hair hits the top of her neck.

And I was like, what does that mean?

And she couldn’t tell me.

And I’m sure my daughters got it from one of their mothers of their friends.

So I was just wondering what that meant and where did it come from?

So are you all from Alaska originally or do you hail from somewhere else?

What are we talking about here in terms of migration patterns and geography?

Well, I have been in Alaska for over 40 years.

My kids are all adopted.

They’re from various.

Most of my daughters are born and raised in Alaska.

But the only thing I can account it to is that they do have friends whose parents come from the South.

And it’s possible that they, you know, that I’m sure that’s where it came from.

I’m sure my daughters had friends and their moms were combing their daughter’s hair.

And then somehow my daughter picked it up.

And my oldest daughter then said it to my granddaughter.

So it was the hair or the neck or both together?

It’s the hair and the neck.

It’s mostly the hair and the nape of the neck.

Gotcha.

It is an African-American term for sure, mostly common.

I mean, white Southern Americans will also use it.

The Dictionary of American Regional English has some citations for it going back to the 1970s.

But the earlier roots for it are even more interesting to me in that they come from the Scots language.

We have those back to at least the 1830s.

But in that particular case, it refers to like a twist of rope or a knot in a string or anything that’s like kind of twisted together,

Very much like you would do with a braid or certain hairstyles at the back of the neck.

Yeah, that word is kinch, right?

Yeah, kinch, yeah.

Yeah, and I mean sort of a kink.

Oh, kinch.

A kinch, yeah.

And so clearly we have a great long history of the Scots language influencing American English,

Especially in the American South, and I’m sure that that’s the homological origin for that.

Well, I guess it surprises me that it comes from all that far back.

Yeah.

But knowing that they moved into that area, it doesn’t surprise me.

So it has nothing to do with kitchen?

No, it doesn’t seem to have anything to do with kitchen.

No, it’s just a coincidence that they sound the same.

There’s a lot of those kinds of coincidences in language.

But you hit upon, like I said, a perfect part of it.

It’s very strongly tied to African-American language in the United States.

It’s not all that common among white American English speakers.

It might be reinforced by the use of hot irons.

I’ve heard that as a false etymology, you know, that it’s like, you know, the kitchen is hot and you’re using a hot iron back in that area.

But it’s not actually the origin.

It’s just kind of a false support.

So there you go.

That’s the best we can do.

Well, thank you so much.

Yeah, sure.

Yeah, I had no idea where it came from.

All right.

Thanks for calling.

All right.

Thank you.

Take care now.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

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