The academy is not paradise. But learning is a place where paradise can be created. Bell Hooks More Quotes by Bell Hooks More Quotes From Bell Hooks I celebrate teaching that enables transgressions - a movement against and beyond boundaries. It is that movement which makes education the practice of freedom. Bell Hooks movement teaching practice ..Critically intervene in a way that challenges and changes. Bell Hooks challenges way War in its essence is another form of capitalism. Wars make people rich - and they make a lot of people poor, and they take a lot of people's lives away from them. So much of the war that is happening is the attempt of one group to snatch the resources of another group. Bell Hooks essence war people Honesty and openness is always the foundation of insightful dialogue. Bell Hooks foundation insightful honesty Commitment to truth telling lays the groundwork for the openness and honesty that is the heartbeat of love. Bell Hooks honesty heart commitment Most of us did not learn when we were young that our capacity to be self-loving would be shaped by the work we do and whether that work enhances our well-being. Bell Hooks self would-be love Love does have the power to redeem but only if we are ready for redemption. Love saves us only if we want to be saved. Bell Hooks redemption doe want It is necessary to remember, as we think critically about domination, that we all have the capacity to act in ways that oppress, dominate, wound (whether or not that power is institutionalized). It is necessary to remember that it is first the potential oppressor within that we must resist – the potential victim within that we must rescue – otherwise we cannot hope for an end to domination, for liberation. Bell Hooks way firsts thinking Only grown-ups think that the things children say come out of nowhere. We know they come from the deepest parts of ourselves. Bell Hooks knows children thinking The greatest movement for social justice our country has ever known is the civil rights movement and it was totally rooted in a love ethic. Bell Hooks rights justice country Whether we're talking about race or gender or class, popular culture is where the pedagogy is, it's where the learning is. Bell Hooks race class talking A central theme of all about love is that from childhood into adulthood we are often taught misguided and false assumptions about the nature of love. Perhaps the most common false assumption about love is that love means we will not be challenged or changed. Bell Hooks childhood love-is mean There must exist a paradigm, a practical model for social change that includes an understanding of ways to transform consciousness that are linked to efforts to transform structures. Bell Hooks effort understanding way Often in my lectures when I use the phrase “imperialist white-supremacist capitalist patriarchy” to describe our nation’s political system, audiences laugh. No one has ever explained why accurately naming this system is funny. The laughter is itself a weapon of patriarchal terrorism. Bell Hooks laughter white laughing The white worker who has been displaced at General Motors has more in common with the displaced black worker than those larger white CEO's, and those Wall Street people who are determining their fate... whose thievery and greed is determining their fate. Bell Hooks wall fate white Women are often belittled for trying to resurrect these men and bring them back to life and to love. They are in a world that would be even more alienated and violent if caring women did not do the work of teaching men who have lost touch with themselves how to love again. This labor of love is futile only when the men in question refuse to awaken, refuse growth. At this point it is a gesture of self-love for women to break their commitment and move on. Bell Hooks teaching commitment moving …“white supremacy” is a much more useful term for understanding the complicity of people of color in upholding and maintaining racial hierarchies that do not involve force (i.e slavery, apartheid) than the term “internalized racism”- a term most often used to suggest that black people have absorbed negative feelings and attitudes about blackness. The term “white supremacy” enables us to recognize not only that black people are socialized to embody the values and attitudes of white supremacy, but we can exercise “white supremacist control” over other black people. Bell Hooks color exercise attitude I would also say that, in practice, many more Americans are anarchists than would ever use that term. Bell Hooks anarchist use practice Feminism is the struggle to end sexist oppression. Its aim is not to benefit solely any specific group of women, any particular race or class of women. It does not privilege women over men. It has the power to transform meaningfully all our lives Bell Hooks race struggle men We live in a world with serious class complexes. It is one thing to be a college student with loan debts and another thing to be just dirt poor for your entire life. The challenge is to come up with more complex understandings of where we are, more global awareness of what connects Americans with what is happening with suffering and oppressed people all around the world. Bell Hooks college class people