I think it’s pretty ironic that I got this book as part of Chi Omega’s BLM/Anti-Racist Book Club, right before I deactivated. I’d considered deactivating from Chi Omega sometime during the winter quarter of my sophomore year for personal reasons, but it was during summer 2020 that I seriously reconsidered my membership in greek life and decided that I no longer wanted to be affiliated with it and its inherent institutionalization of racism (among many other abhorrent -isms).
Mikki Kendall’s Hood Feminism highlights the need for the feminist movement to move its focus away from increasing the privilege of the already privileged women (like middle/upper-class white women) and towards increasing the rights of the most vulnerable women (like Black, Brown, LGBTQ+, disabled women). Each of the book’s chapter touches on important issues like gun violence, hunger, fetishization, missing and murdered indigenous women, education, housing, reproductive justice, and allyship. Although I had thought about and/or studied each of these topics, the way in which Kendall tied each of these issues to feminism in ways that I hadn’t before was eye-opening.
Most of the statistics mentioned in this book came as a shock to me, even if I’d known about the general trends — I realized I’ve been more naïve than I thought I’d been, as I found myself thinking, ‘I knew it was bad, but I didn’t know it was that bad.’ In addition to the incredibly well-researched statistics, Kendall’s personal story as a veteran and single mother who had to leave an abusive relationship and rely on food stamps helped illustrate what Hood Feminism is really about: survival.
Quotes/Perspectives That Made Me Think
- “everything that affects women is a feminist issue”
- “There’s nothing feminist about having so many resources at your fingertips and choosing to be ignorant.”
- “Those most at risk of losing their right to vote are those for whom voting is the only access they have to any semblance of political power.”
- “But to paraphrase James Baldwin, to be aware of what is happening in this world is to be in an almost perpetual state of rage. Everyone should be angry about injustice, not just those experiencing it.”
- How Kendall views guns as “tools”: “the people wielding them are the deciding factor in whether that tool is used safely or unsafely.” But then goes on to somewhat qualify her view by recognizing that “the presence of a gun in a domestic violence situation makes it five times more likely that a woman will be killed. Women get killed by these guns because they are available, because their partners are violent, because an accident with a gun is more likely to be fatal, because of a dozen mundane reasons made worse by the availability of weapons.”
- The alleged “necessity” of guns in the hood and in rural communities: “What compounds the problem of violence in the hood is the long history of isolated Black communities in America not being able to trust law enforcement […] The same attitudes from law enforcement can be found in rural areas, where help may be farther away and weapons are a key part of life because hunting for food is still common. In both cases, gun culture often develops out of necessity.”
- The reframing of reproductive justice to include the entire spectrum of choices surrounding every stage of women’s health, reproductive or otherwise, not just with regard to access to safe abortions. “Reproductive justice is fundamentally about agency and autonomy,” which includes the right to have a baby as well as the right to not have a baby.
- On the relationship between anger and respectability — “Demands that the oppressed be calm and polite and that forgiveness come before all else are fundamentally dehumanizing.” Kendall’s discussion of anger as a tool for demanding justice and her criticism of respectability politics was reminiscent of some people’s reactions to the Black Lives Matter protests last summer.
As an intersectional feminist — which everyone should be — I recognize that, on top of gender, social identities like race, class, sexual identity, and ability all affect my place in society. Although learning how to navigate this patriarchal world as a woman will be challenging for me, things like colorism, class privilege, ableism, etc., happen to put me in a more privileged position than most other women for whom feminism desperately needs to be about survival rather than privilege. Reading Hood Feminism was a great starting place for me to read and learn more about women who may need feminism more than me and most women I personally know. After reading each chapter, though, I couldn’t help but feel frustrated at the lack of solutions — both on the pages of the book, and in society. I guess if it were that easy, this book wouldn’t need to exist.
