Communion: The Female Search for Love: 2 (Love Song to the Nation, 2)

Product Information

A passion for love had to be kept secret—unstated. To speak one's longing was to risk shame. Those who knew love enjoyed its delights in private, and those who did not suffered in silence" (p. 59). What has the feminist movement done for relationships? Sure, the civil uprising has led to more respect for women in the workplace. What, though, has feminism done to help women suffering from intimacy deficiency in the bedroom? Bell Hooks seeks to answer these questions and more in her book. The words of bell hooks are intimate and universal at the same time. She should have been here for many years to come, and the only comfort now is that her words will be here always. Imani Perry Dieses Buch handelt von der Stellung der Frau in einer patriarchalisch geprägten Gesellschaft. Es handelt von Gleichberechtigung und Vorstellungen, die längst überholt sind und ganz wichtig, von Selbstliebe. Die Texte lassen sich leicht und flüssig lesen. Aber leider, leider konnte mich das Buch nicht überzeugen. While never quite deeming it so, hooks recognises the limits to loving, and does not mean love to be an endless crusade for those who choose to practice it in vain pursuit of those who are not willing to heal past wounds and nurture love. Once we recognise that abuse and domination are antithetical to love, we can also recognise that “the healthy, loving response to cruelty and abuse is putting ourselves out of harm’s way” (p. 43). All About Love manages to offer a kind resolution to the pain carried within by those among us who submit to endless suffering in their effort to love. For hooks, loving is about assuming responsibility about causing pain, and in the absence of such accountability, it “is a gesture of self-love … to break their commitment and move on” (p. 49).

I also liked the way she tore into our culture's devaluation of platonic and queer relationships: In heterosexist, patriarchal culture, the only commitments that are deemed truly acceptable and worthy are those between straight women and men who marry. When I first began exploring what it means to be a white man, and an aspiring feminist ally, I believed that feminism was just about the liberation of women. But bell hooks’ work challenged me to think about pain I had experienced in my life and how this pain was the byproduct of patriarchal thinking and living. Her work was not about centering men’s experiences, but rather illustrating the damage that patriarchy also enacts on men. Dominator culture has tried to keep us all afraid, to make us choose safety instead of risk, sameness instead of diversity. Moving through that fear, finding out what connects us, reveling in our differences; this is the process that brings us closer, that gives us a world of shared values, of meaningful community.

bell could hold passionate anger at the social and cultural structures of oppression and domination – and still fiercely love those compromised by them. Despite her personal suffering in the patriarchy, bell somehow had the capacity to see that “patriarchal culture does not care if men are unhappy” and that men are also aggrieved by the “failure of love”. Her empathy astounds. Um, but anyway, so it’s, uh, even though it’s very feminist and rooted in a kind of critiquing patriarchy, the whole sense of this book really is that people are just people; men and women aren’t that different. It’s not men are from Mars. Women are from Venus. We all just wanna have a kind of connection and feel love. Um, and the kind of how we’re all, um, limited and being able to do that by our culture and society and, um, kind of some suggestions for overcoming that. So I highly recommend this just for general reading. I mean, especially like my best friend who is reading this, if you’re someone who’s really been struggling with your romantic life, um, this is a really fantastic book. Um, just five stars recommend everyone. I think everyone should read this. Um, and I will be continuing with, um, bell hooks, his other books about love, so she wrote a kind of a love trilogy. This is the third book. Um, I mentioned in my November TBR video that I will be continuing with the other two books in the trilogy.

Personal integrity is the foundation of self-love. Women who are honest with themselves and others do not fear being vulnerable. We do not fear that another woman can unmask or expose us. We need not fear annihilation, for we know no one can destroy our integrity as women who love." she did bash on patriarchal men a lot (love) but she never blamed men or suggested that women were the victim. she empowered women to take accountability and to put in the work to find and create meaningful, mutual love. i love how she wrapped the book up by talking about the importance of all love - self love, romantic friendships, and romantic love and how we need all of them to live a fulfilled life, and that giving and receiving love from yourself and close friends is what enriches romantic relationships.

Best bell hooks Quotes

There was a lot less I disagreed with in this book, and I could see she made more of an attempt to be LGBTQ+ inclusive (although weak and insufficient). NEW YORK - DECEMBER 16: Author and cultural critic bell hooks poses for a portrait on December 16, ... [+] 1996 in New York City, New York. (Photo by Karjean Levine/Getty Images) Getty Images She says that she started writing this book as a message to other women in middle life. Still, then it ended up being kind of so comprehensive and so much about what she wished that she had known that, uh, she really, then it was written for an entirely female audience, right. Ich bin recht unvoreingenommen an dieses Buch gegangen, da es für mich das erste Buch von bell hooks war. bell’s reminder, in Teaching to Transgress, that “no education is politically neutral” have been my anchor and guiding light as a teacher, mentor and scholar. So much of my professional identity, which bleeds into my whole self, I owe to the work, ideas and writings of bell hooks. I envision her now, IN GLORY, on the ancestral plane wondering over the beloved community she helped to create and inspire. Gloria Steinem

I’m just throwing that out there. Um, in terms of tone, this book is amazing. It’s essentially a very candid conversation from like a close female mentor was kind of how, how I was feeling it. It’s like, this is the sort of female mentor that I wish I had in my life who could just sit down maybe with a glass of wine and just very lucidly. And candidly, just say like, this is how the world works. Um, and like here’s, uh, here’s what you should do in response to it. Um, so I think that style is just really lovely. It makes this book very easy to read, even though it’s talking about some really tough topics and really complicated topics. Um, her writing is just so simple and clear and beautiful that you can just follow her message consistently.

See a Problem?

The one person who will never leave us, whom we will never lose, is ourself. Learning to love our female selves is where our search for love must begin.' If any female feels she need anything beyond herself to legitimate and validate her existence, she is already giving away her power to be self-defining, her agency.' It is obvious that many women have appropriated feminism to serve their own ends, especially those white women who have been at the forefront of the movement; but rather than resigning myself to this appropriation I choose to re-appropriate the term ‘feminism’, to focus on the fact that to be ‘feminist’ in any authentic sense of the term is to want for all people, female and male, liberation from sexist role patterns, domination, and oppression. As we leave behind the stuff of the past that is mere burden, the relationships that bind rather than set us free, as we experience a change of heart, we develop the inner strength necessary to journey on the path to love, to make our search for love be a grand life adventure and a profound spiritual quest. Along the way we do find soul mates, true friends, life companions. We find communion. Another great wisdom gift that women offer to those who have not yet discovered its pleasures is the wisdom that it is better to know the joy of dancing in a circle of love than to dance alone. While a romantic partner and/or soul mate may bring us joy, we add that joy to love already shared with all those who are truly primary in our lives -- the circle of people to whom we turn, who turn to us -- knowing that they will find us eternally there. No matter how sweet the love between two people, we ask too much if we demand that this relationship and this one other person be 'everything.' The truth we hold close is that 'love is everything.' And because love has this power, it is always there within us, within those we love. It offers to us the possibility of ongoing communion." Born Gloria Jean Watkins, the author and feminist cultural critic published an insightful, inspiring and emotive collection of writing, with her death sparking grief across the globe.