The Thammasat University Libraries have acquired a book examining the science, history, and folklore of people with red hair.

Readers interested in the scientific reasons why some people have red hair can find related books on genetics and dermatology in the TU Libraries collection. There are also many articles available through the TU Libraries research databases which offer up-to-date information on this complex question. Red: A History of the Redhead by Jacky Colliss Harvey also discusses aspects of religion, politics, feminism, literature, and art involving red-haired people. Known in the UK as ginger hair, this naturally occurring color inspires different beliefs. In Thailand, one legend claims that people born with ginger hair have an unusual odor. While this belief is clearly not true, it is apparently held by some Thais. The Thai artist Imhathai Suwatthanasilp overlooks such unproven rumors and uses red-colored hairs in dramatic sculptures, as The Nation newspaper described in an article last year. Khun Imhathai sees hair as

a symbol of identity, something that’s powerful in its physicality yet also incredibly personal. For nearly a decade, she has been crocheting strands of human hair – that of others’ as well as her own – into wondrous mixed media art that relate to significant episodes in her life… This is the first time [she has] experimented with synthetic hair. The oily effect of the red-coloured hair projects an image of blood vessels.

A world-wide story.

Only about one or two percent of the world’s population is born with red hair. Red hair remains the rarest natural hair color among people. People of northern or western European origins tend to have more red hair than other populations. The word redhead has been used in the English language since around the year 1500. The origins of redheads dates back much further. One DNA study states that some Neanderthals had red hair. Perhaps surprisingly, in Asia, red hair has been found among the ancient Tocharians, who lived more than one thousand years ago in northwestern China. In what is today Xinjiang, China, red-haired mummies were found. They were dated back to around the year two thousand BC. Supposedly, in Central Asia the redheads were replaced by Asians around 3,000 years ago.

In the Chronicles of the Persian historian Rashid-al-Din, an ancestor of Genghis Khan is described as having red hair and green eyes. In the same source, when Genghis Khan first met Kublai Khan, he was surprised to see that Kublai Khan was not a redhead like his distinguished ancestor. In Central Asia as far as Siberia, groups such as the Scythians and Khazars included redheads. In Afghanistan and Pakistan, some genetic traces of these groups remain. In Asia, people born with red hair remain unusual, but they do appear in Cyprus, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Turkey, Caucasia, Northern Kazakhstan, and among Indo-Iranians. More often, in Asia people choose to tint their hair with henna, creating a red effect that looks more or less natural.

Around the world.

In Papua New Guinea, Polynesia, Morocco, Algeria, and even Ancient Greece, red-haired people have been observed. Even so, redheads are more usually found in the United Kingdom. In Scotland and Ireland, fully 10% of people have red hair. Some Ashkenazi Jewish people from Central and Eastern Europe also have red hair. This caused problems for redheads during times of violent anti-Semitism. During the Spanish Inquisition starting in the 1400s with the religious persecution of people not considered to be loyal Catholics, redheaded people were accused of being Jewish. This happened whether or not they really were.

Different attitudes.

According to the time and country, red hair has been valued or despised. Some people believe that redheads often get angry. In the popular novel The Catcher in the Rye, by the American author J. D. Salinger, which is in the TU Libraries collection, one character notes:

People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily, but [my brother] never did, and he had very red hair.

According to traditional Hindu Ayurveda (life-knowledge) medicine in India, redheads have a fiery temperament. Sometimes if an important person has red hair, this can become a fashionable look, as it was in England around 1600. At that time, Queen Elizabeth I of England was a famous redhead. A study of witches from the 1500s claimed that red hair was the sign of a witch, werewolf, or vampire. In ancient Egypt, redheaded men were burned in sacrifices to the god of the dead, Osiris. In England today, sometimes ginger-haired people are the targets of prejudice, and the word gingerphobia is used to describe this. Even worse, in Australia today, redheads are sometimes called rangas, a short way of referring to the orang-utan, a red-haired ape. In all these places, anyone who is different, especially when they are children at school, may be singled out and ridiculed. This became extreme in 2008 when a Facebook group was launched to start a National Kick a Ginger Day. This idea came from a 14-year-old boy in Vancouver, Canada, and drew many protests.

In Asia and other parts of the world.

The Chinese word ang mo means red-haired. In Malaysia and Singapore, it is used to refer to white people, sometimes in the form ang mo gui, which means red-haired devil. There is disagreement over whether these terms are offensive to people today. In the Straits Times, the bestselling English-language newspaper of Singapore, one reader wrote in 2004 to explain:

My Singaporean friends felt the term ang mo was definitely racist. Said one, with surprising finality: The original term was ang mo gui which means red hair devil in Hokkien. That’s definitely racist. … Both ang mo gui and gwailo – Cantonese for ghost (white) guy – originated from the initial Chinese suspicion of foreigners way back in those days when the country saw itself as the Middle Kingdom.

Another reader wrote in to agree, stating:

Stop calling me ang mo. As an ang mo who has lived here for over six years, I hope more people will realise just how offensive the term is.

Yet still another reader had the following more philosophical or tolerant opinion:

To have my Chinese Singaporean friends call me ang mo is more humorous than anything else. As no insult is intended, none is taken.

In other parts of the world, redheads try to celebrate their difference, as in the annual Irish Redhead Convention or Redheadday, a festival in the city of Breda, the Netherlands. This Dutch event focuses on artworks using the color red, and not just people with that hair color. Imhathai Suwatthanasilp is obviously not the only artist to draw inspiration from this unusual hair color. These inspirations draw directly on religious and mythological traditions, for example the Norse god Thor being described as having red hair. Or in the Iliad of Homer, where the heroic fighter Achilles is sometimes described as having red hair. In the early Christian religion, Mary Magdalene, a follower of Jesus who was said to have witnessed his crucifixion and resurrection, is usually shown in paintings as having long red hair. On the downside, Judas Iscariot, one of the original disciples of Jesus, who betrayed him in exchange for money, is also described on occasion as being a redhead. This may be one important source of the sometimes negative view of redheads in the Christian world.

(all images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)