bell hooks: poet and academic

Born in Hopkinsville, Kentucky as Gloria Jean Watkins, hooks took to poetry early in life.  She earned a PhD and went on to author over 30 books and won numerous awards.  It was only in the late seventies she began publishing poetry under the pen name bell hooks – a tribute to her great-grandmother, Bell Blair Hooks, using all lowercase to distinguish the two names and perhaps pointing to the importance of content of her work over the name associated with it.

Her work explored the interaction of sexism, racism and economic disparity. Her seminal work Ain’t I a Woman? was named one of the 20 most influential books published in 20 years.  A lifelong activist, hooks insisted that social theory had to speak to and impact the experience of the oppressed to have value: that “our intellectual work will never impact on their lives if we do not move it out of the academy”.

bell hooks in the Library

Ain’t I a woman: Black women and feminism   305.48896073  HOO – also available as an [ebook]

Black looks: race and representation   305.48896073  HOO – also available as an [ebook]

Talking back: thinking feminist, thinking Black   305.48896  HOO – also available as an [ebook]

We real cool: Black men and masculinity   305.38896  HOO – also available as an [ebook]

Image credit: Ikusgela, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons