Talk:Bell hooks/Archive 1

Content of her ideas

[For 15 months, the following contrib appeared after a misplaced contrib, suggesting that it was a response to the misplaced one. Thus those who recall the following one as part of a discussion should be aware that it actually was the earliest entry on this talk page -- though it could be responding to an earlier edit summary, or to the content the article had at that time.]
--Jerzy•t 09:53, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
she is herself a reactionary, unable to acknowledge the present realities of the wonderfulness of capitalism
—Preceding unsigned comment added by 165.134.155.202 (talk • contribs) 04:14, 15 January 2004

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There's no content here but slogans and book titles. What makes her famous? Does she have a mainstream publisher, an organization she works half- to full-time for, a substantial following verifiable by their membership in an organization she is one of the top 3 people in? Who does more with her ideas than talk about them? What has she done in the last 20 years besides write? Are there ongoing projects that claim she is their primary inspiration, or that they made some concrete change in their work in response specifically to her? Does she live off her book sales? Family money?

Crucially, does she say anything that is verifiably distinguishable from slogans, and if not, are they verifiably rallying anyone? --Jerzy 05:55, 2004 Feb 22 (UTC)

I now note that i erred in thinking i had seen the whole article, when i read (and edited) only the opening graphs and scanned only the (IMO) mislocated book list: my section edit did not expose me to the section (also in need of editing IMO) devoted to one book. I cannot assert that "There's no content here but slogans and book titles", as i've only glanced at that final section; nor do i know whether that section answers the questions i put forth above.

Also, i do now note her co-authorship with Cornel West, which IMO is not decisive but is to me the most encouraging sign that i've noted so far.
--Jerzy 04:30, 2004 Feb 23 (UTC)

Jerzy, outside of wikipedia I understand and agree with your concerns. However, I think that wikipedia is not the place to decide if a famous scholar is deservedly famous. For the record, I think that bell hooks is slightly more deservedly famous than most scholars, while I also think that most scholars are more famous than they deserve (I found Ain't I a Woman? articulated many of the points Judith Butler makes in the beginning of Gender Trouble and much of Bodies That Matter, but in an understandable way and coming from experience, not theory).

If your concern is that some rabid bell hooks fan created this page to inflate the reputation of an unknown scholar, I assure you this is not the case and hooks is relatively well known. If your concern is that she is incorrectly well known the best you can do is find criticism of hooks and include it in the article, which I encourage you to do. Hyacinth 23:58, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Thanks, Hyacinth, and sorry not to have made myself clearer. I agree that the quality of her scholarship is not at issue -- except in the sense that in the absence of other evidence, absence of quality scholarship would be an additional problem. "Talk is cheap", and slogans are even cheaper than scholarship, in the sense that people enunciating slogans that no one listens to are "a dime a dozen", i.e., even less famous than the people who do excellent scholarship that no one cares about (and are about "a dollar a dozen").

As i noted, the association with West makes it more likely that someone cares enough about her (perhaps for her slogans, or better yet, by a little, for her scholarship).

I'm afraid Butler's name means nothing to me, which in a sense is one of the reasons that i edited the Talk rather than considering putting hooks on VfD. I don't mean to claim expertise re this article.

I'm also reassured somewhat by your fairly non-sloganistic defense of her significance, tho i do continue to be concerned (at least as much in terms of the incompleteness of the article, as in terms of how correct its inclusion is) about the silence about the two-decade-wide elephant in the living room:

1. Has she turned down academic appointments bcz she considers academic life some form of sellout (or perhaps just boring to tears)?
2. Or because she gains more money and/or influence thru her publications than she could hope for academic life to provide?
3. Is she unable to get an academic appointment, and if so what are the various views on why?

Reason #1 would make her idiosyncratic but contributes a little to evidence of fame; reason #2 would be significant evidence of fame; reason #3 wouldn't prove non-fame, but (at least in the absence of explanatory details) it is part of a pattern that may or may not, in her case, add up to a failure to overcome the presumption (to which everyone is subject) of non-fame.

--Jerzy 19:18, 2004 Feb 24 (UTC)

Tnx, H., for the credentials. Not the most important thing in the article, but IMO one of the crucial ones. You've made me comfortable with it. [smile]
--Jerzy(t) 19:03, 2004 Feb 25 (UTC)

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[The following contrib was originally placed at the head rather than the tail of its section, and preceding an (earlier but) undated contrib that may have appeared to have been elicited by the following one. Thus those who recall it as part of a discussion should be aware that it seems to actually be simply an isolated comment.]
--Jerzy•t 09:53, 18 August 2006 (UTC)
We need give greater discussion of her ideas - her importance in changing (liberal) femisism that largely concerned itself with the concerns of white middle class women, her views on how men are just as important and needed for the feminist struggle as whites were for the civil rights movement,etc,etc--65.30.13.177 06:29, 8 May 2005 (UTC)

Ain't I a Woman

Mnograph moved to Ain't I a Woman?.Hyacinth 05:53, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I just by chance ran across, after having put the matter out of my mind, the edit that H. was presumably referring to: it removed three 'graphs about the monograph (read "book" if you don't care to know the details), with them or their substance being added to Ain't I a Woman?. That page was eventually moved/renamed to what is now Ain't I a Woman? (book), and the change of the bare original lk to

[[Ar'n't I a Woman?|Ain't I a Woman?]]

(in an unsigned edit that i haven't the patience to track down in the history) was apparently someone's unfortunate (tho not necessarily irresponsibly executed) attempt to deal with the effects of, i think, the division of an article: one nominally on Ar'n't I a Woman?, a work of Sojourner Truth, which article, i'm guessing, must have become overwhelmed by material on the work that hooks named after it.
--Jerzy•t 20:39, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

date of graduation

• In 1973, she graduated Stanford University in 1976,...

Does anyone notice anything wrong here? –Matt 01:03-1:14, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC) Time-stamp on three-edit passage touched up to satisfy my bloody-minded thoroughness in this retrofitting of proper attribution of this talk page. --Jerzy•t 19:20, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Anti-white?

I have yet to find anything in her work that would qualify as anti-white and I have now read four of her books as well as several of her articles. She argues for a more inclusive feminism that recognizes that oppression takes many forms that rarely act indepently of each other. This article needs some serious revision. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Parrhesiasts (talk • contribs) 18:43, 23 March 2005

I removed the text. I still wonder, does she spell "'Black' with a capital but spells 'white' in lower-case"? Hyacinth 21:27, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Yes, Anti-white, but . . .

Her writings certainly are "anti-white," if by white one means the concept itself of whiteness, and along with that, the divisive, artificial, social construct of race. She is not, however, anti-white PEOPLE. She writes approvingly of many paticular white people, and of many ideas and such expressed by various white people. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.118.164.181 (talk • contribs) 00:56/7, 13 May 2005

Anti-white or pro-African American??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.66.200.1 (talk • contribs) 14:55, 12 January 2006

currently?

_ _ Gloria Watkins is not on the faculty list at City College. Also, in her book "Teaching Community" she says that she left the university.
_ _ Can this be verified?
—Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.184.209.211 (talk • contribs) 22:45, 30 July 2005

bell hooks is currently on the faculty at Berea College in Kentucky as Distinguished Professor in Residence, which lists her in that capacity since 2004. I have updated the page to account for that. She is referred to on that website only as bell hooks, not as Gloria Watkins. I am not sure why she left academia, if that indeed is the case, or if there is any reason that she returned to Berea in particular. What remains unclear is the nature of her role at Berea: She is affiliated with some activities of the Women's Studies Department (e.g. "Monday Night Feminism") but there are no references to any courses being taught presently or previously. Thetwentyninthbather 22:51, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

The lower case is true of everything that could be expected to go thru Berea's PR dept, but at least one colleague there puts her on a reading list in caps.
--Jerzy•t 17:23, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Buddhism

I would say that very little of bell hooks work makes reference to buddhism except in articles she writes specifically on the topic (e.g. The Shambhala Sun articles I have the wikipedia entry linking to). When she does speak of buddhism it is often about socially engaged buddhism, a term coined by Thich Nhat Hanh (a Zen master she know studies under) but which as a movement has taken on a signifigance far beyond his work alone. I plan to make the change article to mention that it is only some of her work that deals with Buddhism and wanted to give y'all a heads upParrhesiastes —Preceding unsigned comment added by Parrhesiastes (talk • contribs) 17:02, 8 December 2005

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Bell hooks/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

I have given this article a B-Class rating, and a mid-level importance. While hooks is quite notable within her own field(s), I do feel like it leans towards the lower end of "mid", as described in the biography guidelines. As to the B-Class, my feeling is that while basic information is presented accurately, and generally well enough cited, the whole article has a bit too chatty tone, and the overall flow is somewhat weak. It is informative, but it's definitely not writing that sparkles. It would also be nice to have more detailed descriptions of hook's concrete theoretical work—if not book-by-book, than at least with more specificity on individual concepts and trends. LotLE×talk 17:02, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Last edited at 17:02, 24 August 2006 (UTC). Substituted at 20:23, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

Improving the page

After all of that (with the acknowledgement that it is unresolved just yet), it's worth remembering that this page is still pretty small. I'd like to hammer out a discussion on how we can improve it, and a plan for expansion. Mostlyharmless (talk) 06:43, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

I was hoping to work in some mention of some other hooks books (e.g. "Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center"), but I'm not sure where to fit it in. I recently un-stubbed the "Feminist Theory" article, so it's worth linking to, hopefully. Ticklekitty666 (talk) 22:07, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

The sections on her books have numerous organization, tone, and copyediting errors. I haven't read any of bell hooks' works, so I don't know whether my fixes would be correct. Gvprtskvnis (talk) 18:30, 3 April 2016 (UTC)