Synopses & Reviews
Mainstream rhetoric has made a concerted effort to polarize African Americans and Latinos, emphasizing differences in language and religion, while designating one or the other as the “favored minority” at will. In Witness, Amalia Mesa-Bains and bell hooks invite us to reexamine this politically popular binary and consider which differences are manufactured and which are real.
In Witness, Mesa-Bains and hooks explore their own similarities and differences, sharing the ways their childhoods, families, and work have shaped their political activism, teaching, and artistic expression. Drawing on shared experiences of sexism, classism, and racism, hooks and Mesa-Bains show how people from divergent cultural backgrounds can work together for radical social change.
While the black/Latino divide and the increasing cross-community political collaboration has been addressed in progressive newspapers and magazines, Witness, an inclusive call to reflect and act, is the first of its kind to look at these issues in depth. And Amalia Mesa-Bains, a pioneer scholar and producer of Chicana art, with bell hooks, one of the most acclaimed of African American theorists—prove an unparalleled match for the job.
bell hooks is one of the leading public intellectuals of her generation. She has written extensively on the emotional impact of racism and sexism, particularly on black women, as well as the importance of political engagement with art and the media. In her recent work on love, relationships, and community, she shows how emotional health is a necessary component to effective resistance and activism.
Amalia Mesa-Bains is an artist, curator, and writer who has initiated comprehensive exhibitions of Latino art, including Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation and Mi Alma, Mi Tierra, Mi Gente: Contemporary Chicana Art. Her artwork incorporates various aspects of Chicano/a history, culture, and folk traditions, exploring religion, ritual, and female rites of passage. She won a MacArthur Fellowship in 1992.
Synopsis
In these provocative and timely conversations, renowned cultural critic bell hooks and MacArthur Fellow and artist Amalia Mesa-Bains explore feminism, sexuality, popular culture, and how to best develop healing and sustaining political movements.
The extended dialogues between hooks and Mesa-Bains in Openings reveal intriguing differences of approach to creativity, politics, and teaching between hooks and Mesa-Bains. In their discussion of cross-cultural and cross-racial activist alliances, hooks and Mesa-Bains riff on the rewards and challenges of coalition-building and the viability of an oppositional politic shared by African Americans and Latinos.
Amalia Mesa-Bains is a California-based artist, curator and writer who has been associated with a number of pioneering exhibitions of Latino art, such as Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation and Mi Alma, Mi Tierra, Mi Gente: Contemporary Chicana Art. Her powerful work incorporates various aspects of Chicano/a history, culture, and folk traditions, and explores religion, ritual, Chicana history, and female rites of passage, and the role each plays in the development of the Latina psyche.
bell hooks is one of the leading public intellectuals of her generation. She has written extensively and persuasively on the emotional impact of racism and sexism, particularly on black women, as well as the importance of political engagement with art and the media. In her recent work on love, relationships, and community, she shows how emotional health is a necessary component to effective resistance and activism. hooks has also written widely on radical pedagogy.
Synopsis
Provocative conversations between feminist critic bell hooks and Chicana artist Amalia Mesa-Bains on politics, power, creativity.
About the Author
San Francisco resident Amalia Mesa-Bains is an artist, scholar, curator, and writer who has been involved in the Chicano artist movement since the 1960s. A leading installation artist and MacArthur awardee, Mesa-Bains incorporates Chicano culture and folk traditions into her work, utilizing themes inspired by Catholic rituals, Mexican pre-Christian religious imagery, Chicana history, and female rites of passage.