Emerging out of Bell Hooks’s frustration with the failure of the
black liberation movement and the women’s liberation movement to include the concerns of black women,
Ain’t I a Woman: black women and feminism traces the oppressive forces of racism and
sexism as they affect black women in the United States. It argues that race and sex are intertwined aspects of identity and cannot be understood apart from each other. Written from a feminist perspective, the book examines the impact of sexism on black women during slavery, the devaluation of black womanhood, sexism among black men, racism among white women, and black women’s involvement with feminism. In so doing, it attempts to move beyond racist and sexist assumptions regarding black women and to further the dialogue about and understanding of their experience. Finally, as it shows the deep interconnections between sex and race, the work places black women’s struggle for liberation in the context of a larger movement for the liberation of all people.
Ain’t I a Woman is structured as a critique of the dominant misconceptions, myths, and stereotypes regarding black women that white society has developed and fostered and that many black women have been socialized to accept. Beginning with the passage from Africa and slave life, the book describes the brutal methods slavers used to break black women’s will—methods that included rape, whipping, and branding—thereby establishing the origins of the devaluation of black womanhood. It continues with the horrible treatment of black women slaves, illustrating how household labor was not necessarily less degrading than field labor: Black women slaves in the household were under constant surveillance, at the mercy of the whims of their mistresses and the lust of their masters.
Looking at the repercussions of slavery, Hooks discusses the racist mythology which depicted all black women as sexually loose and the stereotypes of Aunt Jemimas, Sapphires, and Amazons. She attacks the mistaken notion of matriarchy in the black family, reminding the reader that black women had none of the power commonly associated with matriarchs. She addresses the problems of the job market, explaining that although many black men have remained unemployed, refusing low-status jobs was deemed acceptable for them. In contrast, black women often had to sacrifice their personal dignity, all the while encountering condemnation for their efforts.
In addition to her historical account and her confrontation of stereotypes, Hooks examines the sexist exclusion of black women by Black Power advocates and the racist exclusion of black women by feminists. She shows how various civil rights advocates and Nation of Islam supporters emphasized the authority of the black man. Further, she documents how white feminists have been reluctant to heed the concerns of black women. For example, despite the claims of some white feminists that the women’s liberation movement has a long antiracist tradition, Hooks points out that white women in the nineteenth century tended to be antislavery but not antiracist. Indeed, part of the efforts of white women in the abolition movement were motivated by the desire to keep white men away from black women. Furthermore, many white suffragettes argued that white women should be granted the right to vote on the grounds that it would help maintain white supremacy.
Yet, Hooks reminds those in both the Civil Rights and the women’s movements that neither racism nor sexism can be overcome through separatism. Real change requires that people confront those attitudes within themselves and then find ways to work together for
social transformation. She concludes with a view of
feminism as neither a struggle to end male chauvinism nor a movement for equal rights. Instead, it is a commitment to ending domination on a variety of levels, including sex, race, and class.
Ain’t I a Woman is an inspired and angry work. Having grown up in the segregated South, Hooks wrote it while working as an operator for the telephone company and sought directly to meet the needs of the other black women with whom she worked. Her goal was to write a book that would both improve their lives and make other people aware of the hardships of being black and female. Thus emerging from pain and rage, the book exposes the strengths and sufferings of black women. Indeed, Hooks’s ability to engage the reader comes as much from her disturbing content as from her passionate tone. As it argues for the connection between racist and sexist oppression,
Ain’t I a Woman challenges its readers to pursue a collective and multi-dimensional approach to liberation.
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