I thought this was interesting, from Wikipedia:

The rise in popularity of reggae music in the 1970s and the worldwide fame of singer and songwriter Bob Marley prompted an interest in locks internationally. The anti-establishment philosophy of Rastafari, echoed in much of the reggae of the time, had a particular resonance for left-leaning youth of all ethnicities — especially and primarily among African Americans and other Blacks, but among counterculture whites as well.

Like the afro, locks also can have social and political ramifications. For some peoples of African descent, locks are a statement of ethnic pride. Some see them as a repudiation of Eurocentric values represented by straightened hair. For some, the rejection of ideas and values deemed alien to African peoples (which locks embody) sometimes can assume a spiritual dimension. Similarly, others wear locks as a manifestation of their black nationalist or pan-Africanist political beliefs and view locks as symbols of black unity and power, and a rejection of oppression and imperialism. While most Rastafari sects welcome all ethnicities and the history of locks attributes the hairstyle to almost all ethnic groups, some blacks who attach strong ethnic meaning to locks disapprove of the wearing of locks by nonblacks, viewing such practice as a form of cultural appropriation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreadlocks

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