…that masked the fact that feminism was in no way a challenge or a threat to capitalist patriarchy. This is among the concluding statements to bell hooks’s 1981 text Ain’t I a Woman, which takes the question asked by Sojourner Truth in front of a group of white feminists in 1851. By asking this question, but also coupling that question with specific evidence based in ontological thinking as opposed of prescriptive or descriptive discussions of attributes, qualities, and behaviors (that is: being a woman as a […]
Black women and feminism
Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism (1981) by Bell Hooks is another book from my 50 Books Every Woman Should Read Before She Turns 40 List. Bell Hooks is a black woman, a feminist and social activist. While going through school, she found that her women studies courses and the books she read did not reflect her own experiences as a Black woman. When she tried to bring in her own experiences, her voice was often ignored or disregarded. Because there were no books discussing […]
Sometimes a good book just doesn’t do it for you.
I came to All About Love: New Visions via The Shared Shelf group over on Goodreads (its Emma Watson’s Feminist book club). I didn’t read the February selection, but I thought this one, the March selection, sounded like a good idea. Written in 1999, All About Love is a series of interconnected non-fiction essays by bell hooks where she endeavors to explain how our everyday understandings of giving and receiving love often fail us. I’ll admit, I was left cold in the first few chapters. […]
The Tender Memoir You Might Not Expect From a Radical Feminist
I hope I will not be criticized for enjoying Bone Black: Memories of Girlhood simply as a childhood memoir of well-known feminist lecturer and author bell hooks. It was surprising to me how sweet and tender her quickly sketched remembrances of her childhood could be, as they were unexpected from someone so admired (and by some reviled) for her outspokenness and advocacy for and about women, especially women of color. Mrs Smith Reads Bone Black by bell hooks