Ain't I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism

Her observations are wise. Her grasp of history is absolute. Her ideas stimulate intelligent and loving thought, conversation, and action. Read this book.


Here is where it all began   April 11, 2001
 17 out of 19 found this review helpful

Those who would dismiss Hook's scholarship and arguments as substandard are truly threatened by the radical observations she makes about the world and black women's relationship to it and in it.

The "Clif Notes" version Hooks has been maligned for by her critics have been practiced openly by white feminists (and predominantly white groups) so I honestly cannot see what the criticism is about unless it is the particular ideas themselves and not the way they are phrased. Hook's work is radical because it forces readers to deal with the less than favorable aspects of American history.

Confronting the real truth about America and the way it has historically treated and maligned women of color (and how they moblized against this) can be a challenging read, but only if the reader comes in with a defensive mind, prepared to discount the work anyway. Individuals with an open mind should love the pages of this now-classic work.

I have always loved this book and it's practical insights on gender roles and a multifaceted approach to reproductive rights. Although Hooks is pro-choice, she reminds us that legalized abortion should be only one aspect of reproductive rights, and freedom from sterilzation abuse and full information on contraceptives is also important. It is a testament to Hooks and other activists that this paradigm has been adopted by the general feminist movement.

True women's liberation involves the liberation of all women from all artificially constructed notions about gender and ethnicity. While we as a nation have historically seen the civil rights movement as primarily for black men, and the feminist movement as being for white women, we have silenced and subjugated the black feminist who has one foot in each of these communities and is going to weave together her own experiences.


Exposing the Dynamics Behind the Devaluation   December 6, 2000
 0 out of 2 found this review helpful

I love this book! I think she had done an excellent job on dissecting the classist, racist, sexist structures that have kept black and mixed black women at the bottom of all the racial/class/gender hierarchy. She wrote a chapter about how privileged white women historically used their racial and class privileges to block black and other women of color(mexican, american indian,puerto rican) from access to wealth, power, influence, and especially, upward mobility. They also blocked poor and working class white women(to a lesser extent, for they also have white skin privilege like their sisters)from realizing their potential. Privileged white women just want to preserve their privileges they obtain and keep other women from having them. White feminists tend to protect the status quo, mainly privileged white christian heterosexual men. For example, the Anita Hill case. It have brought far more changes in politics and, once again, white women have benefited more than black women(new 2001 Senate will have 13 women, all white).
As for the antimiscegnation laws, I knew they were originally enacted to prevent white men to marry black women. If a lot of powerful white men were to marry black women and other women of color besides east asian and mexican women, white power will be gone for good. Which was the reason why American media didn't covered the royal wedding of the Prince of Liechtenstein and the black Panamanian woman. They do not like to see black women taking their cherished places as wives of powerful white men. Bell Hooks have done an excellent job on her book. I hope I look forward to see her publishing more of her works soon.






Useful but rudimentary; like a cliff notes to other thinkers   September 24, 2000
 4 out of 24 found this review helpful

The phenomenon that is bell hooks is both interesting and necessary. She has popularised political discussion, extending her hand outside of accademia in powerful ways. So why the single star? Because in evaluating a book like this, it is iimportant to evaluate the originality and rigor of a writer/scholar's work. bell hooks is wonderful at one thing: paraphrasing original thinkers, and that is simply inexcusable. Original feminist thinkers on race (many of who hooks shamelessly borrows from) are Toni Cade Bambara, Michelle Wallace, Hazel Carby, Toni Morrison, Angela Davis... there a long list, and bell hooks does not hold up to them under any kind of scrutiny. Her often true assertions are superficially considered and her clumsy prose resembles that of a beginning idealogue, not a careful and crafty writer/thinker.