Summary Of Ain T I A Woman By Bell Hooks

In her book Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism, bell hooks focuses on the condition of black female life in America. hooks discusses the external social oppressive forces of racism and sexism influencing the oppressive lifestyle for black women. The core of this oppressive social atmosphere as hooks writes is the historically established “social hierarchy based on race and sex that ranked white men first, white women second, though sometimes equal to black men, who are ranked third, and black women last” (53). hooks suggests that this structure “was a calculated method of social control” enforced by racist and sexist stereotypes such as the matriarchy myth and the “idealized feminist […being] a passive subordinate role in relationship …show more content…
This novel takes place in the predominantly black community of Bottom, a place set apart outside of direct white interrelations or presence, in other words a place void of white supremacy and a racially oppressive atmosphere. Even without these explicit oppressive pressures, Morrison creates the mother/daughter relationship between Helene Wright and Nel Greene that is deeply, yet subtly affected by the lingering presence of America’s social structure. As hooks states, “most Americans, and that includes black people, acknowledge and accept this hierarchy” based on race and gender as “black women and men attempted too adapt the values and behavior patterns deemed acceptable by whites” (53; 55). Considering hooks’ suggestion that many black Americans accept white values, one can understand the extent to which Morrison presents characters and relationships confined within racist and sexist standards even in a small black community not explicitly defined by white oppressive notions and stereotypes, and to understand how black communities and families allow racism to negatively define their