Ending Global Violence Through Radical Feminist Theory: The Teachings of bell hooks on Power and Domination

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Acknowledgements

This review is part of a broader research project supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation. I would like to thank the many people, near and far, who have assisted in my writing of, and inspired this article. David Bilembo, Charlotte Mertens, David Mwambari, Ximena Osorio Cortes, Jonathan Luke Austin, Ange Kasongo, Armelle Choplin, Aline Nanko Samake, Didier Péclard, and Karen Büscher, credit goes to you too. My thanks also go to all the Civil Wars’ editorial team, especially Alex Waterman, Rebecca Tapscott and Daniel Rincón Machón whose hard work, generosity and constructive comments throughout the writing process have significantly improved this review.

Notes

1. bell hooks is the pen name of Gloria Jean Watkins, and her grandmother’s name. In this article, as in her literary works, bell hooks is never capitalised. This is how she, along with other feminist activists, chose to write her name following her decision to take the focus away from her persona and onto her ideas.

2. bell hooks on Speaking Freely with Ken Paulson, 29 March 2016. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2bmnwehlpA.(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2bmnwehlpAAccessed (11 April 2023).

3. See bell hooks (2020) ‘Violence and Intimate Relationships. A Feminist Perspective’. Laura L. O’Tool, Jessica R. Schiffman and Rosemary Sullivan (eds.), In Gender Violence, New York: New York University Press.

4. For a helpful analysis of hooks’ notion of ‘radical love’, see Glass (2009).

5. For a discussion on the term ‘postcolonial’, see Brydon (2004), or Rutazibwa and Shilliam 2018.

6. Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR) and Security Sector Reform (SSR) programmes.

7. See Susan Goldberg, Editor in Chief. For decades our coverage was racist. To rise above our past we must acknowledge it. National Geographic, published 12 March 2018. Available at https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/article/from-the-editor-race-racism-history. Accessed 26 April 2023.

8. See Maïka Sondarjee, Critical race theory and feminism are not taking over our universities, The Conversation, published on May 1, 2022. Available at https://theconversation.com/critical-race-theory-and-feminism-are-not-taking-over-our-universities-175030. Accessed April 15, 2023.

9. Author’s italics.

10. Fanon, Frantz. [1952]2008. Black skin, white masks. London: Pluto Press. See also, Ahluwalia, P., & Zegeye, A. (2001). Frantz Fanon and Steve Biko: Towards Liberation. Social Identities, 7(3), pp.455–469.

11. Saïd, Edward (1978), Orientalism. New York: Vintage; Edward Saïd, (1983), The World, the Text and the Critic, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

12. Aidan Russell in Teaching about Troublesome Violence | IHEID (graduateinstitute.ch), accessed 17 April 2023.

13. Civil Wars in particular has published recent work on this.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation [PZ00P1_201869/1].