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Where We Stand: Class Matters
Drawing on both her roots in Kentucky and her adventures with Manhattan Coop boards, Where We Stand is a successful black woman's reflection--personal, straight forward, and rigorously honest--on how our dilemmas of class and race are intertwined, and how we can find ways to think beyond them.
172 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2000
238 people are currently reading
14662 people want to read
About the author
bell hooks
162 books14.2k followersbell hooks (deliberately in lower-case; born Gloria Jean Watkins) was an African-American author, feminist, and social activist. Her writing focused on the interconnectivity of race, class, and gender and their ability to produce and perpetuate systems of oppression and domination. She published over thirty books and numerous scholarly and mainstream articles, appeared in several documentary films and participated in various public lectures. Primarily through a postmodern female perspective, she addressed race, class, and gender in education, art, history, sexuality, mass media and feminism.
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October 3, 2024
I really loved this book – but I have enjoyed all of her books so far. Class is a particularly interesting subject for someone like hooks to tackle, as being both black and female means that there are really good reasons why she might not want to talk about class at all. It isn’t just Marx that says that class issues are key to fundamentally changing society, but even someone like Luhmann also claims that all other forms of disadvantage can be overcome without fundamentally changing society – but to change the class relations in society requires a complete change in how society works. So, someone that can see the gross disadvantages presented to women and to blacks by society might not be terribly keen to hear, particularly not from white men, that these issues are very much ‘secondary’ and will be solved anyway once the real work of overcoming class distinctions is achieved.
And, of course, all this needs to come with the proviso to ‘not hold your breath’ in waiting.
I couldn't help thinking through this that the US always talks of itself as a classless society - an absurdity, obviously, but it is the founding myth of the country. But Marx also wanted to achieve a classless society. These are two very different ideas of what 'classlessness' means.
Although those who talk the most about class often end up being a bit racist and a bit sexist, hooks certainly does not go to the opposite extreme and claim that class issues are irrelevant. Quite the opposite – in fact, she repeatedly points out that what makes black shame or female shame real and all consuming is often not really about being black or female, but about being poor, or about being shown as being from the wrong class.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about Max Weber and his view of religion (particularly protestant religion) and the impetus it provided the development of capitalism. The short version is that the Calvinists believed that the world was playing out under god’s eternal plan. Each of us is born in sin and so even the very best of us deserves to go to hell - you know, literally deserves this fate, so revolting in god's sight are we. This means we should live a frugal life, much as Jesus did and hope for salvation, even if we don't actually deserve it. So, given everything has already been planned, and god has already decided our fate, even before we were born, and since we all deserve to go to hell, how can we tell if we will go to heaven? Well, the short answer is we can’t. But, it sort of makes sense that if you are successful in this life, it might be because god is fond of you, and if that is the case, then perhaps economic success and frugal reinvestment of the profits into the continued growth of that success would be a kind of measure of god’s fondness for you and therefore of your chances of getting into heaven. And thus the great evil notion that is associated with Capitalism (the idea that economic success is identical with moral worth) was born.
This wasn’t the religion bell hooks was raised in. Her religion was associated with community and looking out for one another and had a deep respect for the least amongst us, she quotes from the Book of Matthew, the passage about Jesus needing clothes and food and being in prison and the rich not providing any of these for him (him in the guise of the poor the rich ignored) and therefore of them being sent to hell. This religion required a deep respect for the poor – something that more modern versions of consumerist capitalism have done away with to a great extent. Today we judge and are judged by what we possess, and the poor believe they will be fine if they can only afford a new iPad or iWatch or designer label clothes. We measure our worth in the quantities of things we possess. It is Weber’s vision with the call to frugality removed and each of us seeking to live beyond our means. We need to be conspicuous in our consumption, it is the only way we can have any worth at all.
This book is also an autobiography – from the punishing poverty of her early life, the mistreatment she received at the hands of rich white girls at the first college she attended, girls who thought they could trash her room and then become her friends because everyone knows that black girls just want to be white girls and if they can never actually be that, at least they can have white friends. That hooks didn’t want that sent these girls into complete confusion. The book then follows her life as she became slowly better off, but then discusses the complications this presented her – not least in relation to how she felt about herself. You move away from your family and your class to become ‘educated’, but too often the cost of the education is that you become someone other than who you were, the pathway out is also a path away – while you may never be fully accepted into the new world, you have lost your rights to belong in your old world too. Again, this is a constant theme in literature (from Great Expectations to The Singing Detective) and in social theory – Goffman, Foucault, Claude Steele, Bernstein, Bourdieu all fill pages and pages on exactly this theme. However, it is a theme I never tire of, it is, in many ways, the story of my own life and so I always find something new to understand from it.
This is a brilliant book – she writes so insanely well, so clear, not academic, movingly. She says at one point that she found this a very hard book to write and a couple of times found herself doubled over in tears writing it. I can completely believe this. The shame associated with poverty, with being ‘from the wrong class’, is something that eats at your soul and something that leaves wounds that are more easily reopened than healed. Hooks has lived this, her writing resonates with both a deep knowledge of what such a life means, but also a deep understanding of why such lives exist in our society and how things could be so different from what they are.
A powerful and moving book.
And, of course, all this needs to come with the proviso to ‘not hold your breath’ in waiting.
I couldn't help thinking through this that the US always talks of itself as a classless society - an absurdity, obviously, but it is the founding myth of the country. But Marx also wanted to achieve a classless society. These are two very different ideas of what 'classlessness' means.
Although those who talk the most about class often end up being a bit racist and a bit sexist, hooks certainly does not go to the opposite extreme and claim that class issues are irrelevant. Quite the opposite – in fact, she repeatedly points out that what makes black shame or female shame real and all consuming is often not really about being black or female, but about being poor, or about being shown as being from the wrong class.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about Max Weber and his view of religion (particularly protestant religion) and the impetus it provided the development of capitalism. The short version is that the Calvinists believed that the world was playing out under god’s eternal plan. Each of us is born in sin and so even the very best of us deserves to go to hell - you know, literally deserves this fate, so revolting in god's sight are we. This means we should live a frugal life, much as Jesus did and hope for salvation, even if we don't actually deserve it. So, given everything has already been planned, and god has already decided our fate, even before we were born, and since we all deserve to go to hell, how can we tell if we will go to heaven? Well, the short answer is we can’t. But, it sort of makes sense that if you are successful in this life, it might be because god is fond of you, and if that is the case, then perhaps economic success and frugal reinvestment of the profits into the continued growth of that success would be a kind of measure of god’s fondness for you and therefore of your chances of getting into heaven. And thus the great evil notion that is associated with Capitalism (the idea that economic success is identical with moral worth) was born.
This wasn’t the religion bell hooks was raised in. Her religion was associated with community and looking out for one another and had a deep respect for the least amongst us, she quotes from the Book of Matthew, the passage about Jesus needing clothes and food and being in prison and the rich not providing any of these for him (him in the guise of the poor the rich ignored) and therefore of them being sent to hell. This religion required a deep respect for the poor – something that more modern versions of consumerist capitalism have done away with to a great extent. Today we judge and are judged by what we possess, and the poor believe they will be fine if they can only afford a new iPad or iWatch or designer label clothes. We measure our worth in the quantities of things we possess. It is Weber’s vision with the call to frugality removed and each of us seeking to live beyond our means. We need to be conspicuous in our consumption, it is the only way we can have any worth at all.
This book is also an autobiography – from the punishing poverty of her early life, the mistreatment she received at the hands of rich white girls at the first college she attended, girls who thought they could trash her room and then become her friends because everyone knows that black girls just want to be white girls and if they can never actually be that, at least they can have white friends. That hooks didn’t want that sent these girls into complete confusion. The book then follows her life as she became slowly better off, but then discusses the complications this presented her – not least in relation to how she felt about herself. You move away from your family and your class to become ‘educated’, but too often the cost of the education is that you become someone other than who you were, the pathway out is also a path away – while you may never be fully accepted into the new world, you have lost your rights to belong in your old world too. Again, this is a constant theme in literature (from Great Expectations to The Singing Detective) and in social theory – Goffman, Foucault, Claude Steele, Bernstein, Bourdieu all fill pages and pages on exactly this theme. However, it is a theme I never tire of, it is, in many ways, the story of my own life and so I always find something new to understand from it.
This is a brilliant book – she writes so insanely well, so clear, not academic, movingly. She says at one point that she found this a very hard book to write and a couple of times found herself doubled over in tears writing it. I can completely believe this. The shame associated with poverty, with being ‘from the wrong class’, is something that eats at your soul and something that leaves wounds that are more easily reopened than healed. Hooks has lived this, her writing resonates with both a deep knowledge of what such a life means, but also a deep understanding of why such lives exist in our society and how things could be so different from what they are.
A powerful and moving book.
March 21, 2018
bell hooks shares her upbringing and personal history with us in this book, and for that reason it is worth savoring. She has a very conversational style in this book; she is not writing a polemic. But she is teaching. This book reminds us that America does indeed have a class hierarchy, and indicates how that plays out for citizens.
hooks reminds us that in a culture where money is the measure of value, it is believed that everything and everybody can be bought. But money is not the standard where other values are more important:
This book was published in 2000, shortly after hooks’ prolific period studying, writing, speaking in the 1990s. The push for more—more money, more power—has always been with us but hadn’t infected the vast middle class, perhaps because it was unimaginable, until this period when unheard-of wealth was within reach for many in the middle class. hooks is just reminding us not to lose our sensibility to the false god, gold.
Chapter Five, called “The Politics of Greed,” is just as relevant now as it was when written twenty years or so ago, perhaps more so. That’s the thing with bell hooks: she seems to have sprung full-grown from the head of Athena or whomever. She is grounded in a way we can dream of, finding her way to answers some of us will only discover in old age, if at all. She talks about addiction in a way that hurts, it seems so familiar to many now.
In her chapter entitled “Being Rich,” hooks explains that the poor and working class have been taught by mass media to think like and aspire to the values and attitudes of the rich ruling classes, ideologically joining with the rich to protect their class interests. We are all taught to believe that the wealthy have earned their right to rule because they are rich, without examination into the sources of that wealth and the exploitation it may represent, and we therefore often abandon any political commitment to economic justice.
In the old days of an emerging Christian ethic, the disciples were puzzled to learn from Jesus that the rich must work harder for grace because they will be tempted to hoard their wealth and exploit others to increase their wealth.
While the black poor were ostracized in the larger society, they managed to stick together, live together, worship together. In some ways, this was unavoidable where the society was segregated. But poor whites lived everywhere, and because of segregation, had no common cause with poor blacks, and were not accepted by wealthier whites. Doubly despised, we could say.
It is not so far from that time to today, when poor whites embarrass their wealthier brethren. hooks is saying that we must bridge this divide and recognize the basic humanity we all share, across race, class, sexuality, and national origin. We have to surrender our attachment to material possessions, eliminate the false hierarchies based on wealth, color, sex, etc. and interact based on more lasting values. A final few chapters suggest ways for us to ease into new relationships with one another.
hooks is indispensable as a thought leader.
hooks reminds us that in a culture where money is the measure of value, it is believed that everything and everybody can be bought. But money is not the standard where other values are more important:
“Solidarity with the poor is the only path that can lead out nation back to a vision of community that can effectively challenge and eliminate violence and exploitation.”Acquiring wealth or items of value make us fearful that someone will take those things away from us. hooks herself had such an experience, having bought a fancy car she found herself being less generous. A material object with which she identified altered her relationship to others. She caught this recognizable mindset exactly: human beings do this. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t admire or have lovely things. We just have to acknowledge they change us and our relationship with others, and find a way to compensate for this. Money or beautiful things is not the point, not the point of our existence. We have to look harder, deeper for that.
This book was published in 2000, shortly after hooks’ prolific period studying, writing, speaking in the 1990s. The push for more—more money, more power—has always been with us but hadn’t infected the vast middle class, perhaps because it was unimaginable, until this period when unheard-of wealth was within reach for many in the middle class. hooks is just reminding us not to lose our sensibility to the false god, gold.
Chapter Five, called “The Politics of Greed,” is just as relevant now as it was when written twenty years or so ago, perhaps more so. That’s the thing with bell hooks: she seems to have sprung full-grown from the head of Athena or whomever. She is grounded in a way we can dream of, finding her way to answers some of us will only discover in old age, if at all. She talks about addiction in a way that hurts, it seems so familiar to many now.
“Those who suffer the weight of this greed-based predatory capitalism are the addicted. Robbed of the capacity to function as citizens of any community (unable to work, to commune with others, even to eat), they become the dehumanized victims of an ongoing protracted genocide. Unlike the drugs used in the past, like marijuana and heroin, drugs like cocaine and crack/cocaine disturbed the mental health of the addicted and created in them cravings so great that no moral or ethical logic could intervene to stop immoral behavior.”We recognize this language today, though the drug choice has changed to opioids.
In her chapter entitled “Being Rich,” hooks explains that the poor and working class have been taught by mass media to think like and aspire to the values and attitudes of the rich ruling classes, ideologically joining with the rich to protect their class interests. We are all taught to believe that the wealthy have earned their right to rule because they are rich, without examination into the sources of that wealth and the exploitation it may represent, and we therefore often abandon any political commitment to economic justice.
In the old days of an emerging Christian ethic, the disciples were puzzled to learn from Jesus that the rich must work harder for grace because they will be tempted to hoard their wealth and exploit others to increase their wealth.
“Nowadays much new age spirituality attempts to undermine traditional biblical condemnation of the greedy rich by insisting that those who prosper are the chosen, the spiritual elect. But there is a great difference between celebrating prosperity and the pursuit of unlimited wealth.”In later chapters hooks addresses the new wealth of American blacks and how allegiance to the new class interests of successful black people may supersede their racial solidarity. We must be mindful that an exploitative rule set allowed certain talents to break barriers most cannot and this should not be taken as the kind of success any of us consider complete. In general and from the outside, it does not appear that successful blacks are ignoring their brethren, but I do not think the same can be said of white citizens. hooks actually addresses this in her chapter entitled “White Poverty: The Politics of Invisibility.”
While the black poor were ostracized in the larger society, they managed to stick together, live together, worship together. In some ways, this was unavoidable where the society was segregated. But poor whites lived everywhere, and because of segregation, had no common cause with poor blacks, and were not accepted by wealthier whites. Doubly despised, we could say.
It is not so far from that time to today, when poor whites embarrass their wealthier brethren. hooks is saying that we must bridge this divide and recognize the basic humanity we all share, across race, class, sexuality, and national origin. We have to surrender our attachment to material possessions, eliminate the false hierarchies based on wealth, color, sex, etc. and interact based on more lasting values. A final few chapters suggest ways for us to ease into new relationships with one another.
hooks is indispensable as a thought leader.
July 11, 2007
Unfortunately, the incisive analyses of bell hooks' earlier books are replaced in this one by cliched, simplistic and repetitive statements and digressive personal narratives. I recommend this to readers who haven't given much thought to class and to its relationship to race in the US, but otherwise you're better off with the essays on class in her earlier collections (try Yearning or Killing Rage).
January 11, 2022
Add bell hooks to my list of favorite authors. Her assessment of American class hierarchy is spot on. And while I don’t necessarily agree with all of her countermeasures, I don’t take umbrage with them either. 4 big stars.
May 20, 2010
I confess I was looking forward to this like chocolate cake, been a bit blue lately, feeling all out of place in that way you do when you come from dirt poor and somehow end up doing a PhD, because in the academic 'us' and 'them', you know you come from the 'them' and proud of it to. And so you get that wtf am I doing feeling and I confess I read this not looking for answers everyone has to struggle for on their own, but a little solace and shared understanding. And I did find that, so much rings true. But it wasn't what I wanted, which means perhaps I am judging unfairly. I am much angrier I think. Ridiculously angry sometimes. I am nowhere near as...complacent is maybe the word, I found this too complacent. Perhaps because I don't share the religious beliefs that permeate much of the morality in this. They are very familiar, very similar to how I was raised, but they aren't mine anymore. I really loved the analysis of how class and race and gender intersect. I agree we need a culture of compassion and caring and sharing to oppose that of greedy individualism when we think about building something new. But I didn't find struggle here, the collective and desperate struggle required to actually change anything, I wondered where it was? And I wondered just what about class war is it she wants to avoid?
November 4, 2024
bell hooks restores my faith in humanity
October 9, 2011
bell hooks makes a lot of important points and connections in these essays on class, as well as on the intersections between class, race, and gender. However, I found it rather repetitive; since each chapter was apparently written as a separate essay it felt as if the same thing was said many times through-out the different essays. Within each essay, I sometimes felt that the writing meandered and it was difficult to follow the train of thought at times. This was my first book by bell hooks and I would definitely like to read more by her, but unfortunately my library does not have many of her books.
July 25, 2011
Her anger is palpable at times. It's a great book to begin to unpack your relationship to consumerism.
January 16, 2022
bell hooks sets up a slow burn in this treatise on the ignored intersectional role that class plays in "classless" America. Blending her own experiences with academic scholarship, she creates a view of the melding of class, race, gender, and wealth that is at times uncomfortable to confront, but always compelling. Even though it was written almost 20 years ago, her points are painfully relevant to today's society. The housing crisis of 2009, for example, she basically predicted in her discussion of debt, class, and housing.
I had a couple issues with her implications that true religion would help us learn to value and prioritize the poor--something I believe can be done without a religious framework. Empathy is something that is taught not only in religious circumstances. She also had quite a critique of what she calls the Me-Me Generation (a term I hate) which I wonder if she would stand behind today. The current generation of young people, although they have grown up in a consumer capitalist society, are arguably the most politically engaged generation since the 60s and 70s. Movements like BLM and the marches against gun violence in schools have proved that they do care about more than themselves and consuming.
The work is optimistic about the changes that can be made by individual people who are politically liberated. I hope bell hooks is right, but I can't say I'm as certain as bell hooks is that democratic socialism is right around the corner.
I had a couple issues with her implications that true religion would help us learn to value and prioritize the poor--something I believe can be done without a religious framework. Empathy is something that is taught not only in religious circumstances. She also had quite a critique of what she calls the Me-Me Generation (a term I hate) which I wonder if she would stand behind today. The current generation of young people, although they have grown up in a consumer capitalist society, are arguably the most politically engaged generation since the 60s and 70s. Movements like BLM and the marches against gun violence in schools have proved that they do care about more than themselves and consuming.
The work is optimistic about the changes that can be made by individual people who are politically liberated. I hope bell hooks is right, but I can't say I'm as certain as bell hooks is that democratic socialism is right around the corner.
April 28, 2025
mein erstes buch von bell hooks, hab sehr viel gelernt!! spannend zu lesen, auch wie sie ihre eigene Perspektive mit Eltern aus der Arbeiter:innenklasse und sich selbst als erste Schwarze Frau aus der Familie am mehrheitlich weißen klassistischen College verknüpft
February 27, 2021
It took me about a year to read this book - not anything to do with the book itself, just my lack of time. but i am glad it took so long as the last few chapters came at a time just when i needed them. they are about crossing class divides and redistributing wealth, which coincided with me finishing a lifetime of study and starting a salaried job. it was reassuring to read that the things I'd been feeling weren't unique and that others before me have crossed those boundaries and prioritise wealth distribution too. how special to find that right now.
(the only downside to the book is that the chapter on young people feels dated in its often disparaging tone)
(the only downside to the book is that the chapter on young people feels dated in its often disparaging tone)
August 9, 2024
bell hooks è sempre capace di parlare di argomenti complessi in maniera semplice e allo stesso tempo efficace, innescando riflessioni sul personale e sul collettivo.
Ma in questo libro supera se stessa, trattando il tema della questione di classe (spesso sovrapposta alla questione di razza o di genere) in maniera esemplare, contro il sistema capitalista e contro la società del consumo.
Femminista, accessibile, perfetto.
Ma in questo libro supera se stessa, trattando il tema della questione di classe (spesso sovrapposta alla questione di razza o di genere) in maniera esemplare, contro il sistema capitalista e contro la società del consumo.
Femminista, accessibile, perfetto.
April 23, 2015
Though I liked this for the most part and found hooks' personal narrative fascinating, I found Chapter 7, entitled "The Me-Me Class: The Young and the Ruthless" to be just another run-of-the-mill old person complaining about the young, for example:
"In part, youth culture's worship of wealth stems from the fact that it is easier to acquire money and goods than it is to find meaningful values and ethics, to know who you are and what you want to become, to make and sustain and friends, to know love." (85)
"This generation has blood on its hands and does not care as long as the blood can be washed away by fancy soaps, aromatherapy, and a host of other little luxuries...When the deluded young are forced to face the reality that we are bound by class, by limited resources...they become rage filled and rage addicted. Only death, self-mutilation, or the slaughter of their peers appeases." (87)
Of course, hooks is writing soon after the Columbine shooting, as she cites it frequently as her main example of why teenagers are godless, stuff-driven machines who apparently are unable to know love in any form.
As many have said before me, hooks rarely cites her sources and often makes broad statements without backing them up with factual data, besides that of her own experience. Perhaps a couple NYC teenagers spray-painted Satanic phrases on her Greenwich Village apartment building, inspiring her to write this chapter about how we are all either obsessed with shopping or obsessed with death. Perhaps she stepped foot in a Hot Topic.
Either way, I found her statements about today's youth demoralizing considering our generation is the one currently being the one forced into abject poverty due to unemployment and student loans. Where we stand is a place where, as many have said, college is framed as a necessity but priced as a luxury. She frequently romanticizes her childhood of church and books without recognizing the fact that religion doesn't work for everyone, especially children of non-traditional families, and reading isn't always encouraged in public high schools, though she claims that public schools are places where "educational standards are excellent" (84). Again, another claim that she does not back up with any factual evidence.
BESIDES THAT, the book is well-written and accessible, something hooks claims that white feminist texts lack (not backed up by source). It's a worthwhile read into a personal narrative of crossing class boundaries and one woman's highly-leftist opinion on the treatment of the poor and the inequality of wealth. While those things do exist and probably have become even worse in the fifteen years since hooks wrote this book, maybe it would be best for her to give us some concrete evidence along with her broad-stroke statements.
"In part, youth culture's worship of wealth stems from the fact that it is easier to acquire money and goods than it is to find meaningful values and ethics, to know who you are and what you want to become, to make and sustain and friends, to know love." (85)
"This generation has blood on its hands and does not care as long as the blood can be washed away by fancy soaps, aromatherapy, and a host of other little luxuries...When the deluded young are forced to face the reality that we are bound by class, by limited resources...they become rage filled and rage addicted. Only death, self-mutilation, or the slaughter of their peers appeases." (87)
Of course, hooks is writing soon after the Columbine shooting, as she cites it frequently as her main example of why teenagers are godless, stuff-driven machines who apparently are unable to know love in any form.
As many have said before me, hooks rarely cites her sources and often makes broad statements without backing them up with factual data, besides that of her own experience. Perhaps a couple NYC teenagers spray-painted Satanic phrases on her Greenwich Village apartment building, inspiring her to write this chapter about how we are all either obsessed with shopping or obsessed with death. Perhaps she stepped foot in a Hot Topic.
Either way, I found her statements about today's youth demoralizing considering our generation is the one currently being the one forced into abject poverty due to unemployment and student loans. Where we stand is a place where, as many have said, college is framed as a necessity but priced as a luxury. She frequently romanticizes her childhood of church and books without recognizing the fact that religion doesn't work for everyone, especially children of non-traditional families, and reading isn't always encouraged in public high schools, though she claims that public schools are places where "educational standards are excellent" (84). Again, another claim that she does not back up with any factual evidence.
BESIDES THAT, the book is well-written and accessible, something hooks claims that white feminist texts lack (not backed up by source). It's a worthwhile read into a personal narrative of crossing class boundaries and one woman's highly-leftist opinion on the treatment of the poor and the inequality of wealth. While those things do exist and probably have become even worse in the fifteen years since hooks wrote this book, maybe it would be best for her to give us some concrete evidence along with her broad-stroke statements.
July 13, 2009
a book that pretends to be an academic account of class in the united states as well as a study of class within the american society. however the book is nothing more than conjecture and personal accounting more than it is research and study. there is more rhetoric in this book than in any cornell west book i have ever read, which i thought would be hard to surpass, and which further separates the author from any academic rating with ethereal and undefined terms such as "a just society" and "justice". the use of these terms with no clear consensus as to their meaning makes them mean whatever the reader feels they should mean and is most likely the point of their ambiguity- to endear the reader to these ideas instead of a solid thesis or outlined plan. the usage of the same style of rhetoric as the founding fathers is annoying, vague terms left up in the air. a constant complaint book from an author who could be a powerful writer but instead leaves us with a petty criticism rather than a penetrating look at issues of class within the society.
January 19, 2015
"The call to live simply is not new news. It was a beacon light only a few years ago. And many of us embraced and remain faithful to communitarian values. Nothing threatens those values more than turning the poor into a predatory class to be both despised and feared..." (p. 48).
"Without education for critical consciousness that begins when children are entering the world of consumer capitalism, there will never be a set of basic values that can ward off the politics of predatory greed" (p. 88).
"...We also believed, a believe now affirmed by experience, that it was possible for us to gain class power without betraying our solidarity toward those without class privilege. One way we achieved this end was by living simply, sharing our resources, and refusing to engage in hedonistic consumerism and the politics of greed. Our goals were not to become wealthy but to become economically self-sufficient. Our experiences counter the assumption that women could only gain economically by colluding with the existing capitalist patriarchy" (p. 108).
"Without education for critical consciousness that begins when children are entering the world of consumer capitalism, there will never be a set of basic values that can ward off the politics of predatory greed" (p. 88).
"...We also believed, a believe now affirmed by experience, that it was possible for us to gain class power without betraying our solidarity toward those without class privilege. One way we achieved this end was by living simply, sharing our resources, and refusing to engage in hedonistic consumerism and the politics of greed. Our goals were not to become wealthy but to become economically self-sufficient. Our experiences counter the assumption that women could only gain economically by colluding with the existing capitalist patriarchy" (p. 108).
June 18, 2025
I think she does a great job of describing class and the role it plays in every part of society and our lives. Like she states, a lot of the time, people always skip of class and the problems that come with it in society and focus on other things like race and sex. She does an amazing job explaining how class has shaped even the internal structure of the black community.
September 22, 2020
The ground moved from under me as I read this book.
January 30, 2022
my first time reading bell hooks and i liked it a lot!
some of the essays were better than others and more interesting but ig thinking that is probably normal for essay collections
some of the essays were better than others and more interesting but ig thinking that is probably normal for essay collections
November 10, 2023
Something tells me this was one of hooks’ least developed books. While her style is to often make strong statements without studies or evidence shared, I usually have confidence what she is saying is right, even if challenging. But this book felt riskier, and she even notes that in subtle ways - that this is hard for her to write about, which is totally fair.
Still, often the ideas are clear and powerful. For me the best bits are around cross-class dialogue, growth, and community. I also appreciate a sort of historical and geographical side view of her personal experience with capitalism from poverty to wealth.
The bit I will take with me the most - the behavior folks in middle and upper class blame on poor folks - Black men especially - consuming material goods beyond means, drug dealing, etc are directly passed on through media and culture from wealthy - usually white men - perpetuating the “get rich quick” myth. Whew.
Still, often the ideas are clear and powerful. For me the best bits are around cross-class dialogue, growth, and community. I also appreciate a sort of historical and geographical side view of her personal experience with capitalism from poverty to wealth.
The bit I will take with me the most - the behavior folks in middle and upper class blame on poor folks - Black men especially - consuming material goods beyond means, drug dealing, etc are directly passed on through media and culture from wealthy - usually white men - perpetuating the “get rich quick” myth. Whew.
January 7, 2025
I feel like i need to write an entire essay on how I feel about this book, how it made me feel about my own poor, working class upbringing & what I want to do moving forward. i wish i could give this book to every single person in the world to read.
October 10, 2023
3.5 stars
I love you bell hooks. Her writing is so accessible and i loved the chapter about her childhood and i like how its repetitive. Repetition is powerful and helps create a melodic and unified flow in a book that centers around one topic, referencing back to a previously stated statement after introducing a new one is the best way to teach a complicated concept and actually helps you remember it! Made me think a lot about hoarding wealth and living simply. A little too religious for my personal beliefs about morality and hard work but i liked reading her thoughts on it. It made me sad that a lot of what she was saying about consumerism in the 2000s has only gotten worse with tik tok. For a book that centered on the idea poverty she didnt really ever define it? Or explain why we should support people getting out of poverty if she was also advocating for us all to live below our means and simultaneously saying that she is wealthy but gives it away and thats also necessary in society? Definitely didnt answer all the questions one could have about class but that’s impossible to do in one book.
I love you bell hooks. Her writing is so accessible and i loved the chapter about her childhood and i like how its repetitive. Repetition is powerful and helps create a melodic and unified flow in a book that centers around one topic, referencing back to a previously stated statement after introducing a new one is the best way to teach a complicated concept and actually helps you remember it! Made me think a lot about hoarding wealth and living simply. A little too religious for my personal beliefs about morality and hard work but i liked reading her thoughts on it. It made me sad that a lot of what she was saying about consumerism in the 2000s has only gotten worse with tik tok. For a book that centered on the idea poverty she didnt really ever define it? Or explain why we should support people getting out of poverty if she was also advocating for us all to live below our means and simultaneously saying that she is wealthy but gives it away and thats also necessary in society? Definitely didnt answer all the questions one could have about class but that’s impossible to do in one book.
October 21, 2020
Okay before I get my criticisms out, I'll quickly list the things I liked about this book. Firstly, the autobiographical sections on growing up poor were very interesting, and secondly, many of the observations Hooks makes about how contemporary (as of 2000 when this was written) western society functions are sound, although most of them were either really obvious, or things I'd read repeatedly elsewhere.
The problem is that my grievances with this text far outweighed the positive aspects. It is very repetitive, often making a point and belabouring it, only to end up repeating it again about 40 pages later (sometimes multiple times). It also isn't well referenced (or referenced at all really), despite Hooks making a lot of statements which could have done with backing up; I have no doubt that a lot of them were true, but Hooks repeatedly makes vague allusions to statistics without actually providing any. There aren't even endnotes, which I found incredibly odd for a book by an academic which at times presents itself as a work of sociology; where are the citations?
My biggest issue however is that despite Hooks' aim of talking frankly about class and her repeated assertions that because of her background she is coming at it from a place of respect, she many times comes across as kind of elitist. At several points throughout the text she goes on these long tangents about poor people living within their means, without seeming to be too concerned about actually lifting people out of poverty. The most bizarre bits of all though were the many sections where she attempted to tie social problems among the poor to a lack of Christian faith and the use of drugs; it was very jarring, because I'd be in the middle of a chapter with some very incisive social commentary, only to suddenly come across a paragraph with an argument that's more akin to that of a conservative fundamentalist (at one point she even points to rappers as a sign of moral/spiritual degradation). The book ends with some pretty limp praise for democratic socialism as a way to curtail the excesses of capital and fix all of these problems, which felt very tacked on and seemed like an effort to divert criticism for societal problems away from the affluent (or at least certain subsections of the rich).
This was my first go at reading Hooks' work. I don't know whether her other stuff is better and I just picked a bad starting point, but I'm not very enamoured with this. The cons really outweigh the pros for me, and aside from the interesting autobiographical account, every other decent thing in this book was stuff I'd read before in other works with better citations. I can't really recommend it.
The problem is that my grievances with this text far outweighed the positive aspects. It is very repetitive, often making a point and belabouring it, only to end up repeating it again about 40 pages later (sometimes multiple times). It also isn't well referenced (or referenced at all really), despite Hooks making a lot of statements which could have done with backing up; I have no doubt that a lot of them were true, but Hooks repeatedly makes vague allusions to statistics without actually providing any. There aren't even endnotes, which I found incredibly odd for a book by an academic which at times presents itself as a work of sociology; where are the citations?
My biggest issue however is that despite Hooks' aim of talking frankly about class and her repeated assertions that because of her background she is coming at it from a place of respect, she many times comes across as kind of elitist. At several points throughout the text she goes on these long tangents about poor people living within their means, without seeming to be too concerned about actually lifting people out of poverty. The most bizarre bits of all though were the many sections where she attempted to tie social problems among the poor to a lack of Christian faith and the use of drugs; it was very jarring, because I'd be in the middle of a chapter with some very incisive social commentary, only to suddenly come across a paragraph with an argument that's more akin to that of a conservative fundamentalist (at one point she even points to rappers as a sign of moral/spiritual degradation). The book ends with some pretty limp praise for democratic socialism as a way to curtail the excesses of capital and fix all of these problems, which felt very tacked on and seemed like an effort to divert criticism for societal problems away from the affluent (or at least certain subsections of the rich).
This was my first go at reading Hooks' work. I don't know whether her other stuff is better and I just picked a bad starting point, but I'm not very enamoured with this. The cons really outweigh the pros for me, and aside from the interesting autobiographical account, every other decent thing in this book was stuff I'd read before in other works with better citations. I can't really recommend it.
March 25, 2021
My Instant Thoughts:
A stimulating but also imperfect book. It has a beautiful and clear style, which even in the
German translation is still nice to read. I liked how well she described how painful social tensions can be, even for social climbers. Her limited Ameican perspective and some superficial exaggerations somewhat diminish the quality.
Her approaches to solving the problems seem remarkably modest from an international perspective:
Reading her book, it seems as if social achievements that are common in other countries of the world are unimaginable or risky demands.
In countries where food, housing, education, and health care for all are provided by the state, her demands for tax exemptions on donations seem more neoliberal than truly class-critical (the U.S. as a whole would be rich enough to provide for its population in general). In the american context, the demands may seem sensible at the moment, but from an international perspective, i think we can see that class differences can become much less painful when poverty no longer threatens basic needs to the extent it unfortunately does in the usa. Also, where she describes how violent gentrification can be in the usa, her specifically american perspective became apparent to me once again:
The observation that property owners are allowed to shoot intruders on their property is already relatively closely linked to the fact that private firearms are sold in supermarkets in the u.s., and so on.
A stimulating but also imperfect book. It has a beautiful and clear style, which even in the
German translation is still nice to read. I liked how well she described how painful social tensions can be, even for social climbers. Her limited Ameican perspective and some superficial exaggerations somewhat diminish the quality.
Her approaches to solving the problems seem remarkably modest from an international perspective:
Reading her book, it seems as if social achievements that are common in other countries of the world are unimaginable or risky demands.
In countries where food, housing, education, and health care for all are provided by the state, her demands for tax exemptions on donations seem more neoliberal than truly class-critical (the U.S. as a whole would be rich enough to provide for its population in general). In the american context, the demands may seem sensible at the moment, but from an international perspective, i think we can see that class differences can become much less painful when poverty no longer threatens basic needs to the extent it unfortunately does in the usa. Also, where she describes how violent gentrification can be in the usa, her specifically american perspective became apparent to me once again:
The observation that property owners are allowed to shoot intruders on their property is already relatively closely linked to the fact that private firearms are sold in supermarkets in the u.s., and so on.
September 25, 2012
I found Bell Hooks to be extremely repetitive and come across as angry more than analytical. While pushing for equality in racial classes, she seemed to be spiteful towards the people of color who had become successful and gained any sort of wealth. I would be curious to seek her opinion about Barak Obama and what it means for us to have a black president. It seems that she thinks those blacks who have risen to financial wealth have somehow betrayed the solidarity of the black cause. I became further incensed by Hooks' comparison of racial conditions to Nazi concentration camps. Hooks says, “…concentration camp-like conditions now exist in this nation in all major urban communities” (2000, p. 92). I gathered from her writing that she believed that lower class conditions, in addition to being a problem only encountered by people of color, was being inflicted by those of the upper class.
December 28, 2016
Raw, honest, incisive social commentary supplemented with rich autobiographical details as hooks explores and shares her experiences and the subtle influences of class on a poor, black woman growing up in a nominally classless society. Hooks chooses this approach partly because she does not have the economic vocabulary to discuss the concept academically. But doing so would miss the point she is trying to make which is that class is not discussed in the Academy nor in the public square since in America it is assumed that class doesn't exist yet clearly everyone knows it does. In her simple yet piercing style she exposes the slights she experienced that were inflicted because of class differences and relates them to the cultural experiences of class and class privilege in America. Prescient observations leading up to the contentious 2016 presidential elections.
January 20, 2019
Bel Hooks blames the individual's desire to have joy in material things as the reason for class inequities. She unfairly judgemental and morally hierarchal. As someone who grew up poor, and changed class positions through education, I was often felt offended by Hook's narrow vision of what that transition should look like.
Classisms should be blamed on capitalism. This book did not do that.
Classisms should be blamed on capitalism. This book did not do that.
June 16, 2007
With bell hooks I am always excited when I like something of hers more than I liked the last thing I read by her. She really just knows how to nail it.
December 26, 2008
Rereading as research. Remembering why I love bell hooks.
September 1, 2024
Neben allen Ismen unglaublich wichtiges & augenöffnendes Buch bezüglich Klassismus! Bell Hooks eh legend ⭐️
April 18, 2025
Quiero decir ya lo sabía pero a veces no está de más recordar el país de m1erda que es Estados Unidos dios brindaré el día de su destrucción ❤️
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