Gloria Jean Watkins (September 25, 1952 – December 15, 2021), better known by her pen name bell hooks,[1] was an American author, professor, feminist, and social activist. The name "bell hooks" is borrowed from her maternal great-grandmother, Bell Blair Hooks.[2]
Gloria Jean Watkins was born on September 25, 1952, in Hopkinsville,[6] a small, segregated town in Kentucky,[7] to a working-class African-American family. Watkins was one of six children born to Rosa Bell Watkins (née Oldham) and Veodis Watkins.[3] Her father worked as a janitor and her mother worked as a maid in the homes of white families.[3] In her memoir Bone Black: Memories of Girlhood (1996), Watkins would write of growing up in "a rich magical world of southern black culture that was sometimes paradisiacal and at other times terrifying."[8]
She began her academic career in 1976 as an English professor and senior lecturer in ethnic studies at the University of Southern California.[16] During her three years there, Golemics, a Los Angeles publisher, released her first published work, a chapbook of poems titled And There We Wept (1978),[17] written under the name "bell hooks." She had adopted her maternal great-grandmother's name as her pen name because, as she later put it, her great-grandmother "was known for her snappy and bold tongue, which I greatly admired,"[citation needed]. She also said she put the name in lowercase letters both to honor her great-grandmother[18] and to convey that what is most important to focus upon is her works, not her personal qualities: the "substance of books, not who I am."[19] About the unconventional lowercasing of her pen name, hooks added that, “When the feminist movement was at its zenith in the late ‘60s and early '70s, there was a lot of moving away from the idea of the person. It was: Let’s talk about the ideas behind the work, and the people matter less... It was kind of a gimmicky thing, but lots of feminist women were doing it.”[20]
South End Press published her first major work, Ain't I a Woman? Black Women and Feminism, in 1981, though she had written it years earlier while still an undergraduate.[10] In the decades since its publication, Ain't I a Woman? has been recognized for its contribution to feminist thought, with Publishers Weekly in 1992 naming it "One of the twenty most influential women's books in the last 20 years."[24] Writing in The New York Times in 2019, Min Jin Lee said that Ain't I a Woman "remains a radical and relevant work of political theory. hooks lays the groundwork of her feminist theory by giving historical evidence of the specific sexism that black female slaves endured and how that legacy affects black womanhood today."[21]Ain't I a Woman? examines themes including the historical impact of sexism and racism on black women, devaluation of black womanhood,[25] media roles and portrayal, the education system, the idea of a white-supremacist-capitalist-patriarchy and the marginalization of black women.[26]
bell hooks in 2009
At the same time, hooks became significant as a leftist and postmodern political thinker and cultural critic.[27] She published more than 30 books,[28] ranging in topics from black men, patriarchy, and masculinity to self-help; engaged pedagogy to personal memoirs; and sexuality (in regards to feminism and politics of aesthetics and visual culture). Reel to Real: race, sex, and class at the movies (1996) collects film essays, reviews, and interviews with film directors.[29] In The New Yorker, Hua Hsu said these interviews displayed the facet of hooks's work that was "curious, empathetic, searching for comrades."[3]
As hooks argued, communication and literacy (the ability to read, write, and think critically) are necessary for the feminist movement because without them people may not grow to recognize gender inequalities in society.[31]
In 2002, hooks gave a commencement speech at Southwestern University. Eschewing the congratulatory mode of traditional commencement speeches, she spoke against what she saw as government-sanctioned violence and oppression, and admonished students who she believed went along with such practices.[32][33]The Austin Chronicle reported that many in the audience booed the speech, though "several graduates passed over the provost to shake her hand or give her a hug."[32]
In 2004, she joined Berea College as Distinguished Professor in Residence.[34] Her 2008 book, belonging: a culture of place, includes an interview with author Wendell Berry as well as a discussion of her move back to Kentucky.[35] She was a scholar in residence at The New School on three occasions, most recently in 2014.[36] Also in 2014, the bell hooks Institute was founded at Berea College.[37]
She was inducted into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame in 2018.[28]
Personal life
Regarding her sexual identity, hooks described herself as "queer-pas-gay".[38][39]
hooks, bell (1996), "Continued devaluation of Black womanhood", in Jackson, Stevi; Scott, Sue (eds.), Feminism and sexuality: a reader, New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 216–223, ISBN978-0231107082.
hooks, bell (2004), "Selling hot pussy: representations of Black female sexuality in the cultural marketplace", in Richardson, Laurel; Taylor, Verta A.; Whittier, Nancy (eds.), Feminist frontiers (5th ed.), Boston: McGraw-Hill, pp. 119–127, ISBN978-0072824230. Pdf.
hooks, bell (2005), "Black women: shaping feminist theory", in Cudd, Ann E.; Andreasen, Robin O. (eds.), Feminist theory: a philosophical anthology, Oxford, UK; Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishing, pp. 60–68, ISBN978-1405116619.
^Dinitia Smith (September 28, 2006). "Tough arbiter on the web has guidance for writers". The New York Times. p. E3. Archived from the original on July 3, 2018. Retrieved February 21, 2017. But the Chicago Manual says it is not all right to capitalize the name of the writer bell hooks because she insists that it be lower case.
^hooks, bell, "Inspired Eccentricity: Sarah and Gus Oldham" in Sharon Sloan Fiffer and Steve Fiffer (eds), Family: American Writers Remember Their Own, New York: Vintage Books, 1996, p. 152.
hooks, bell, Talking Back, Routledge, 2014 [1989], p. 161.
^McGrady, Clyde (December 15, 2021). "Why bell hooks didn't capitalize her name". Washington Post. ISSN0190-8286. Archived from the original on December 15, 2021. Retrieved December 21, 2021. Early on, hooks, born Gloria Jean Watkins, wanted a way to honor her maternal great-grandmother while detaching herself from her work. She wrote dozens of books using her great-grandmother’s name but didn’t capitalize it.
^Williams, Heather (March 26, 2013). "bell hooks Speaks Up". The Sandspur. Archived from the original on February 28, 2021. Retrieved November 10, 2019 – via Issuu.
^Leatherman, Courtney (May 19, 1995). "The Real bell hooks". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Archived from the original on December 16, 2021. Retrieved December 16, 2021.
^"bell hooks." Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2010. Literature Resource Center. Accessed June 12, 2018.
^Guy-Sheftall, Beverly; Ikerionwu, Maria K. Mootry; hooks, bell (1983). "Black Women and Feminism: Two Reviews". Phylon. 44 (1): 84. doi:10.2307/274371. JSTOR274371.
^Olson, Gary A. (1994). "bell hooks and the Politics of Literacy: A Conversation". Journal of Advanced Composition. 14 (1): 1–19. ISSN0731-6755. JSTOR20865945.
^ abApple, Lauri (May 24, 2002). "bell hooks Digs In". The Austin Chronicle. Archived from the original on December 22, 2013. Retrieved December 11, 2013.
^"FeMiNAtions: Despite the pleas and its promotional tone, My Feminism makes a valid point". The Globe and Mail. May 23, 1998. p. 18. ProQuest1143520117.
^"10 Writers Win Grants". The New York Times. December 22, 1994. Archived from the original on November 18, 2021. Retrieved December 15, 2021.
^"Happy to Be Nappy". Alkebu-Lan Image. Archived from the original on December 15, 2021. Retrieved December 15, 2021.
^"bell hooks". The Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning. Archived from the original on December 15, 2021. Retrieved December 15, 2021.
^"Footlights". The New York Times. August 21, 2002. ISSN0362-4331. Archived from the original on March 5, 2020. Retrieved December 15, 2021.
^ abRappaport, Scott (April 25, 2007). "May 10 bell hooks event postponed". UC Santa Cruz, Regents of the University of California. Archived from the original on August 18, 2021. Retrieved December 15, 2021.
^ ab"bell hooks". Loyal Jones Appalachian Center. Archived from the original on December 8, 2015. Retrieved November 30, 2015.
Cited sources
hooks, bell (2005). "Black women: shaping feminist theory". In Cudd, Ann E.; Andreasen, Robin O. (eds.). Feminist theory: a philosophical anthology. Oxford, UK; Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishing. pp. 60–68. ISBN978-1405116619.
hooks, bell; Trend, David (1996), "Representation and democracy an interview", in Trend, David (ed.), Radical democracy: identity, citizenship, and the state, New York: Routledge, pp. 228–236, ISBN978-0415912471
Leitch et al., eds. "bell hooks". The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2001. pp. 2475–2484. ISBN0-393-97429-4
Stanley, Sandra Kumamoto, ed. (1998). Other Sisterhoods: Literary Theory and U.S. Women of Color. Chicago: University of Illinois Press. ISBN978-0-252-02361-3. OCLC36446785.