Toward an Ethic of Mutuality: The Work of bell hooks

In working on an essay recently about Wendell Berry and his book-length essay on American racism, The Hidden Wound, I came upon a related collection of essays by bell hooks, belonging: a culture of place. In her book, hooks (who always used the lowercase) references Berry often and with deep respect. Although Berry is a white man and hooks a Black woman and outspoken feminist, they share a number of core views that, for both, rose out of their childhoods in Kentucky and from their decisions as adults to return to live in the state. Their paths in academia, as students and professors, took them both to California, New York, and elsewhere. But in time, they felt the need to return to Kentucky in order to reestablish a connection to the land and to that all-important sense of community they found there. Turns out, this move also drove them both to write often about the link between environmental justice and racial justice.

Writer and social activist bell hooks

Hooks’ essays in belonging: a culture of place were published in book form in 2009, though they were individually published at various points over the previous decade or two. In all, the essays are compelling, essential works for their insights into what it takes to build a racially just America, as well as for their observations about the troubling impact of capitalism on our views of and connection to nature. As I read, I found myself jotting down numerous passages. One stood out for its direct link the work I do related to education — and that I know is in the hearts of all educators striving for change in our schools and communities.

In “Again — Segregation Must End,” hooks, who died in December 2021 at age 69, explains her return to Kentucky, particularly to the town of Berea, where she would eventually become a fixture in the community and serve on the faculty at Berea College. She admits she knew little about Berea before her visit as a guest lecture years earlier. But she quickly embraced the town — which was founded in 1855 by John Fee, a white abolitionist, and dedicated to the principles of antiracism. The work of antiracism is immensely challenging everywhere in the nation today, but the efforts being in made in Berea, and elsewhere, gave hooks the hope and energy that enabled her to dedicate her life to this work — to her belief that change can come.

In the end of the essay, hooks writes:

“Those of us who truly believe racism can end, that white supremist thought and action can be challenged and changed, understand that there is an element of risk as we work to build community across difference. The effort to build community in a social context of racial inequality (much of which is class-based) requires an ethic of relational reciprocity, one that is anti-domination. With reciprocity all things do not need to be equal in order for acceptance and mutuality to thrive. If equality is evoked as the only standard by which it is deemed acceptable for people to meet across boundaries and create community, then there is little hope. Fortunately, mutuality is a more constructive and positive foundation for the building of ties that allow for differences in status, position, power, and privilege whether determined by race, class, sexuality, religion, or nationality.”

What hooks understood so well is that mutuality is a key element in our positive social evolution. And when mutuality thrives, we thrive.