Central Los Angeles : Feminist Reflects on Black History Month

Noted African American feminist bell hooks (Gloria Watkins) helped Occidental College kick off the observance of Black History Month with a lecture on issues of race and gender.

She is the author of “Yearning: Race, Gender and Cultural Politics,” which won the Before Columbus Foundation’s 1991 American Book Award.

“This is not a month to celebrate black history,” hooks told a crowd of hundreds of Occidental students and members of the community at the Eagle Rock campus. “It’s a month of sharing history.”

Much of the author’s discussion focused on the complexities of being African American and a feminist, two facets of black women’s identities that at times seemed at odds with each other last year, she said, especially in reference to the O.J. Simpson trial and the “Million Man March” in Washington.

“We don’t need black men in the families,” hooks said, who are hurtful and abusive. “We need loving black men,” she said, explaining that this situation is a perfect example of how feminism and African American pride can and must coexist. “We are who we are in our actions,” she said, “and not in our presence.”