The renowned, bell hooks

1. View the ted talk: 'Who was the world's first author?':
TED TALK: Who was the first author?
2. Research a female writer of your choosing (contemporary, or from any time period)
3. Write up the biography of your chosen female writer in the style of a TED talk. Your format and style should be influenced by the above talk, however, personalise it and make it your own. Submit the transcript. 

Word count: approx 300 words

bell hooks

Feminist identities such as Gloria, Malala or even Beyonce have shaped our knowledge of the Feminism movement, but bell hooks bell hooks -all lowercased to bring attention to her work rather than herself. Gloria Jeans Watkins, or by her pseudonym, bell hooks, was an activist who created many pieces of fine works to discuss the connections between race, gender, and class. Brought up in 1952, bell hooks grew up in a segregated community that would later influence her work in changing the world’s perception of what Feminism should be. At the age of 69, she acclaimed what it meant to be an intersectional Feminist. The intersectionality of race, capitalism, gender, and how Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression.

Unlike the first wave of Feminism, such as the suffragettes, focussed mainly on a woman’s legal rights, the second wave of Feminism discussed and explored the women’s experience in areas of politics, work, the family, and sexuality.

Recognising the social classifications that surrounded her environment, she soon came to realise how ignoring their intersection inherently imposes oppression towards women in society.

The oppositional gaze is hook’s essay that uncovers the gaze of a black body as repressed, denied, and ultimately interrogating. Black female actors were analysed next to their white counterparts. This created for critical discussion on how black women in film should serve a bigger purpose, to explore their identity and not serve as a reaction to their white-dominated narratives.

Bell hooks analysed and critiqued her environment to make her aware of its audience. She discussed what many would easily disregard after not making the connections.

“There is power in looking”