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NEWS & LETTERS,
January-February 2002
hooks on life and love
Chicago—Black feminist writer
bell hooks drew out an integrated crowd of more than 500 Black and white women
when she spoke on her new book COMMUNION: THE FEMALE SEARCH FOR LOVE on
Jan. 23. She asserted that the development of self-love, in "the white
supremacist, capitalist, imperialist, patriarchy," is the pivot upon
which all other forms of love and freedom grow." She was wonderfully hostile to
the racist and sexist images that work upon our self-esteem. "In
patriarchy," hooks said, "we must return to the body" as the root
of self-hatred. She said this self-hatred is even worse "when you add
Blackness" to the equation. hooks lauded the feminist
movement for revealing that women are taught that they must earn love rather
than being entitled to it. Women try to stay good little girls, which prevents
our unique gifts and potentials from ever being realized and hurts our
self-esteem. She said that women, and Black
women in particular, can only love themselves when in "communion" or
in struggle with others who seek freedom from this oppressive reality. She
challenged white feminists saying: "Unlearning racism is the only ground we
have" to end the racial divide within the feminist movement. However, her views on the
impossibility of separating the development of self-love (personal) from
struggle against oppression (social) were contradictory. For example, hooks
said, "Until we end the intimate terrorism in our own lives we won't
be able to resolve it with other nations and cultures we don't understand."
This separates the personal from the political. I imagine that many women went
home feeling quite a bit: angry, joyous and empowered all at the same time. I
certainly did. —Sonia Bergonzi |
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