Talking Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Black

by bell hooks

Overview

In childhood, bell hooks was taught that "talking back" meant speaking as an equal to an authority figure and daring to disagree and/or have an opinion. In this collection of personal and theoretical essays, hooks reflects on her signature issues of racism and feminism, politics and pedagogy. Among her discoveries is that moving from silence into speech is for the oppressed, the colonized, the exploited, and those who stand and struggle side by side, a gesture of defiance that heals, making new life and new growth possible.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781317588214
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	10/10/2014
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	208
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

A cultural critic, an intellectual, and a feminist writer, bell hooks is best known for classic books including Ain’t I a Woman, Bone Black, All About Love, Rock My Soul, Belonging, We Real Cool, Where We Stand, Teaching to Transgress, Teaching Community, Outlaw Culture, and Reel to Real. hooks is Distinguished Professor in Residence in Appalachian Studies at Berea College, and resides in her home state of Kentucky.

Table of Contents

Preface to the New Edition 1. Introduction: Some Opening Remarks 2. Talking Back 3. "When I was a young soldier for the revolution": Coming to Voice 4. Feminism: A Transformational Politic 5. On Self-Recovery 6. Feminist Theory: A Radical Agenda 7. Feminist Scholarship: Ethical Issues 8. Toward a Revolutionary Feminist Pedagogy 9. Black and Female: Reflections on Graduate School 10. On Being Black at Yale: Education as the Practice of Freedom 11. Keeping Close to Home: Class and Education 12. Violence in Intimate Relationship: A Feminist Perspective 13. Feminism and Militarism: A Comment 14. Pedagogy and Political Commitment: A Comment 15. Feminist Politicization: A Comment 16. Overcoming White Supremacy: A Comment 17. Homophobia in Black Communities 18. Feminist Focus on Men: A Comment 19. "Whose pussy is this": A Feminist Comment 20. Black Women Writing: Creating More Space 21. Ain't I A Woman: Looking Back 22. Writing Autobiography 23. To Gloria, Who Is She: On Using a Pseudonym 24. Interview 25. Black Women and Feminism

Editorial Reviews

Hooks, a pen name for Gloria Watkins, the author of Ain't I A Woman: Black Women and Feminism , here gathers essays that also focus on being black and feminist in America. She begins by recounting painful personal experiences: growing up in a repressive, Southern, ``father-dominated household,'' attending a segregated high school, struggling to find her own, persuasive voice and become a writer, and learning to deal with racism and sexism while studying at ``predominately white universities'' in Wisconsin and California. Hooks then moves on to a general discussion of the women's movement and how ``white supremacy'' in our society adversely affects it. Although the author makes perceptive and provocative observations, they are diminished by redundancy and weakened by her doctrinaire Marxist rhetoric: ``In resistance, the exploited, the oppressed work to expose the false realityto reclaim and recover ourselves. We make the revolutionary history.'' In addition, the author employs labels such as ``got everything White people.'' Ultimately, she fails to convince or even to use her own voice. (Dec.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Activist/academician hooks ( Ain't I a Woman: Black Women & Feminism and Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center ) has here collected 23 of her angry, intelligent, critical, and compelling essays on subjects as diverse as writing autobiography, teaching women's literature, black homophobia, intimate violence, racist feminists, black porn, and politics at Yale. Her blend of the personal and theoretical, political and intellectual, provides a unique perspective on issues of current concern among blacks, women, and educators. Her writing is lucid, confrontational, and challengingsure to offend a few but, it is to be hoped, sought after by those whose collections include the original, humorous, and courageous. Beverly Miller, Boise State Univ. Lib., Id.

Library Journal

Praise for the book:

"On the one hand, [Talking Back] is a political treatise of the Black feminist movement as it grapples with the contradictions of class, gender, and sexual relations; on the other, it is a deeply intimate account of personal and political maturation within that framework." —Melba Wilson, Feminist Review (1989)

From the Publisher