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Books : Where We Stand: Class Matters |
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 305.50973
EAN: 9780415929134
ISBN: 041592913X
Label: Routledge
Manufacturer: Routledge
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 176
Publication Date: October 04, 2000
Publisher: Routledge
Sales Rank: 41289
Studio: Routledge
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
Where We Stand is a powerful new book by one of America's most admired critics and writers. For years we have turned to bell hooks-feminist, social thinker, memoirist, teacher-for her deeply felt ideas on women, race, culture, sexuality, and more recently on love and children. Now Bell Hooks talks about class-the 'elephant in the room'-the subject we all know is central to our culture and its problems but that hasn't been given the attention it so desperately needs.
Why is it that the face of poverty in America is a black face, even though most of the thirty-six million poor in America are white? How do fantasies of wealth's power help keep the poor poor? What do black teens want, and how do they learn to want it? Are wealthy black Americans any more aware of class issues than wealthy whites? Why do we need so much money, after all?
Bell Hooks talks about these subjects in her own style. Drawing on both her roots in Kentucky and her adventures with Manhattan coop boards, Where We Standis 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.
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
How to sum up bell hooks in under 5 words: not a good writer. She constantly writes that class is the biggest issue of all, which she then contradicts by constantly mentioning the importance of race and money. Worst of all, she repeats the same things over and over to no affect besides being annoying. With some editing, and a less muddled, contradictory thesis/outline, this could have been a good book. But with all of the generalizations and assumptions - on top of everything else I just mentioned - "Where We Stand" is a failure. I'm actually very surprised with all of the positive reviews this book has been given.
hooks, if she had things her way, would make the USA a communist country. Yes there are 38 million people living in poverty, but the population has doubled to 6 billion since 1960 (when the world population was only 3 billion) - much thanks to families, like hooks', who have too many kids (7 in hooks' case). Earth has finite land and resources - when the population goes up so much, it's no wonder there are so many homeless people. Not enough room for everyone, unless you want to completely obliterate the environment or build millions of 40- 50- or 60-story apartment complexes everywhere. On top of that, millions and MILLIONS - 38 million according to hooks - of jobs need to be created.
If hooks truly believes that the poor aren't lazy, then why is it that illegal immigrants find it so easy to find jobs all over the county?(It could be about ... Read More
Rating:  -
I finally decided to come to terms with how class affects the decisions I make and that people make on my behalf. bell hooks is a rigorous thinker who questions assumptions,especially her own. I liked the blend of experience and academic evidence she uses in the essays. Thinking about class raises a lot of emotion, especially shame, and having an intellectual basis for processing it helps. An excellent place to start.
Rating: -
I'm always interested in what bell hooks has to say, but this is one of her best. We hear more these days about the increasing class divide in America, and bell speaks clearly to the cultural issues and access to political power of the working classes, especially when those poorer people are of ethnic groups and when they are women.
Rating: -
Where We Stand: Class Matters by bell hooks
All books written by bell hooks are powerful, direct, and very brave. Exactly when I was hoping bell would write a book about class, I discovered this one. Her writings about love lead to exploration of capitalism and its social structure more in depth, to strengthen points about the ways class loyalties and antagonisms prevent love ethic from becoming embraced by the society as a whole.
What I especially appreciate in Where We Stand are the two quite extraordinary qualities: a) bell showed us that we can talk and write about class without using "post-modern" or difficult to comprehend terminology, and b) she is not afraid to call to action, to change this depressing and unjust, cruel and senseless system into "a world where we can all have enough to live fully and well."
She started the book with self-critique, almost apologizing for not having enough theoretical knowledge to talk about class issues. However, bell is able to discuss very different aspects of class, such as class ideology (or the dominant social ideology being the ideology of the ruling class), class consciousness of the working class and intellectuals, intersections of class, race and gender, crossing class boundaries, and a vision of a classless society--society--without class hierarchies or antagonistic classes.
I read somewhere that some book reviews called this book a "novel". Where We Stand is not a novel, ... Read More
Rating: -
I started reading this book shortly before Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast and news clips began pouring in from New Orleans. More clearly than ever, I understood the need for books like Where We Stand to encourage us to think about issues of class in America and then take action in our own lives.
I read bell hooks because she challenges the notions I have from my white supremacist, patriarchal, capitalist upbringing. Where We Stand continues in this tradition. While reflecting upon the events of her own life and her own actions, hooks is able to examine our culture while inviting us increase awareness of how issues of class impact our own lives. For example, while critically examining the influence of materialism in our society, hooks offers her own personal experience with owning a BMW and how her attitude toward the vehicle subtly affected her relationships with other people.
Anyone willing to examine how class, race, gender, and consumerism all collide will want to read this book.
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