bell hooks

(Ph.D. ’83, literature)

This award will be presented posthumously to bell’s surviving siblings.

bell hooks (born Gloria Jean Watkins) was a noted intellectual, trailblazing author and theorist, cultural critic, artist, poet, and public speaker. Born and raised in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, the fourth of seven children of Veodis and Rosa Bell Watkins, she learned to read and write at an early age—proclaiming as a young child that she would be famous one day. Indeed, bell hooks left an indelible mark on our world.

bell was an inspiring and highly sought-after scholar. She earned degrees in English literature from Stanford University (B.A. 1973) and University of Wisconsin-Madison (M.A. 1976), before earning her Ph.D. at UC Santa Cruz. Her professional teaching career included UC Santa Cruz, Yale University, Oberlin College, The City College of New York, and Distinguished Professor in Residence at Berea College. While at Yale in the 1980s, bell led a support group of Black women called “Sisters of the Yam.” bell’s work with students and her approach to education has played a significant role in her incredible legacy.

Jody Greene, founder of UC Santa Cruz’s Center for Innovations in Teaching and Learning (now the Teaching and Learning Center), was a student at Yale during bell’s time there. Greene (who uses the pronouns “they/them”) says bell’s books about the practice of teaching were deeply influential to teachers like themself. Greene noted, “bell strongly believed in education as the cultivation of a human being and not just an instrument for creating good employees.”

bell published her first book of poems, And There We Wept, in 1978. She chose her pen name to honor her great-grandmother (Bell Star Hooks), preferring all lowercase letters to focus on her message rather than herself. bell’s written works include some 40 books, scholarly and popular articles, essays, poetry, and five children’s books. Her work has been published in over 15 different languages, making her an international favorite loved by many. bell received numerous awards, honors, and international fame for her works as poet, author, feminist, professor, cultural critic, and social activist.

The world knows bell best through her most popular books, Feminism is for Everybody, Teaching to Transgress, and All About Love: New Visions, which re-emerged in the pandemic as a New York Times bestseller.

bell worked to understand and include the trans community in her understandings about feminism, at a time when it wasn’t popular. Her foundational works on feminism, including Ain’t I a Woman, critiqued white feminism and launched conversations around intersectionality before the term was created. In her kindness to all, to feminism more broadly, she was unapologetic in the prioritization of Black women.

bell profoundly cared for young people and children. Many of her children’s books, such as Be Boy Buzz, were aimed at increasing literacy for children of color and providing meaningful representation.

bell’s presence at UC Santa Cruz has remained strong. In the fall of 2007, she drew a large crowd when she gave a lecture called “What’s Love Got to Do With It? Ending Domination” at College Nine and John R. Lewis College (then College Ten). During the lecture, she mentioned the influence and impact of UC Santa Cruz: “It was here as a graduate that I dared to dream beyond the fate that was designated for me as a Black woman,” bell said.

bell dedicated her life to groundbreaking scholarship, while always remaining true to her roots as an Appalachian scholar. Her book, Belonging: A Culture of Place, reflects her grounding in her rural upbringing in contrast to city life.

Her friends say her love for community was both political and personal. First and foremost, she was dedicated to the people around her. She established the bell hooks Institute at Berea College as a platform to preserve her legacy through art and artifacts from her life. She donated her papers to the college in 2015. bell was inducted into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame in 2018.

bell passed away on December 15, 2021, surrounded by friends and family in her home in Berea, Kentucky. Social media was flooded with eulogies and poignant reflections on almost three decades of her work in feminism, teaching, and theory. Many noted the accessibility of her language, as well as her willingness to write from life experience as a way to speak on spirituality and family.