Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.12k reviews for:
Sister Outsider - Essais et propos sur la poésie, l'érotisme, le racisme, le sexisme...
Audre Lorde
4.59 AVERAGE
3.12k reviews for:
Sister Outsider - Essais et propos sur la poésie, l'érotisme, le racisme, le sexisme...
Audre Lorde
4.59 AVERAGE
adventurous
dark
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
So nice to finally have engaged the work of the radical poet from whom the phrase "The Masters tools can never dismantle the Masters house ". This anthology of Lorde's writings and essay's was deeply thought provoking as she expressely related her existence as a Black, queer woman and policies of social control one os forced too confront in our society of racial stratification.
She also strongly speaks to strategies and visions of radical rejection of the norms on the path of a more honest liberation of ourselves in the pursuit of broader social change.
She also strongly speaks to strategies and visions of radical rejection of the norms on the path of a more honest liberation of ourselves in the pursuit of broader social change.
challenging
reflective
Powerful and direct. Cuts through oppressive and regressive societal values like an axe. Timeless.
challenging
emotional
reflective
tense
medium-paced
I really enjoyed the essays although some of them were a little slow. My favorites were definitely the last two or three.
I would like to read these again as part of a book club— some of the language at times was heavy and it would be nice to dissect each essay with a group for further discussion.
I would like to read these again as part of a book club— some of the language at times was heavy and it would be nice to dissect each essay with a group for further discussion.
I first read some of Audre Lorde‘s words for a university class a while ago and I was shocked by the fact that I had never engaged with her writing before. I presented her essay "The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action", which is featured in this collection, in that class because her words and the force of their truth had impressed me deeply.
"I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood. That the speaking profits me, beyond any other effect." I would consider myself a relatively outspoken person on the subject of my and other people‘s rights to equality, but there have been many moments, especially facing those who would have possibly profited the most from hearing my truth, where I have been afraid to voice my thoughts or my anger or my criticism. But "your silence will not protect you", and "it is not difference which immobilizes us, but silence". It is this lesson I needed to learn, then, and which I am still working on implementing today.
"And where the words of women are crying to be heard, we must each of us recognize our responsibility to seek those words out, to read them and share them and examine their pertinence to our lives. That we not hide behind the mockeries of separations that have been imposed upon us and which so often we accept as our own. […] All the […] endless ways in which we rob ourselves of ourselves and each other". Now that I have finally gotten my hands on a copy of Sister Outsider, and sought out the words Audre Lorde was crying and fighting to be heard, all I can do is continue to be shocked and impressed and enlightened and recognized and pushed toward a greater understanding of all the vicious interconnections in the web of marginalization.
As a woman, and a lesbian, much of this collection resonated with me. As a white person, not all of Audre Lorde‘s words were mine to identify with, but I believe this made it only more crucial that I read them, truly let them into my consciousness, learned from them, re-evaluated my own ideas and those around me over and over again.
I will never be capable of fully understanding the experiences of Black women, not with their environments nor within their communities. But many of these essays revealed a dynamic around anger between Black women to me which, quite frankly, I had been too narrow-minded to recognize before. I do not want my words to overshadow those of Audre Lorde, so I will include some quotes here: "Growing up, metabolizing hatred like a daily bread. Because I am Black, because I am woman, because I am not Black enough, because I am not some particular fantasy of a woman, because I AM." So, this anger lashes out at other Black women, "for each of us bears the face that hatred seeks, and we have each learned to be at home with cruelty because we have survived so much of it within our own lives." From this springs the a dangerous dynamic: "If you are not THEIR image of perfection, and you can‘t ever be because you are a Black woman, then you are a reflection upon me. We are never good enough for each other. All your faults become magnified reflections of my own threatening inadequacies."
"For so long, we [Black women] have been encouraged to view each other with suspicion, as eternal competitors, or as the visible face of our own self-rejection." Despite all the distorted and corrosive narratives perpetuated on social media today - the trends that so often subconsciously feed into patriarchal gender roles and capitalist consumption - THIS is why self care is revolutionary: Because "theorizing about self-worth is ineffective. So is pretending. Women can die in agony who have lived with blank and beautiful faces. I can afford to look at myself directly, risk the pain of experiencing who I am not, and learn to savor the sweetness of who I am. […] Know we are worthy of touch before we can reach out to each other."
The following excerpts are a brief summary of more of Audre Lorde‘s striking arguments throughout the collection:
"To those women […] who fear the anger of women of Color more than their own unscrutinized racist attitudes, I ask: Is the anger of women of Color more threatening than the woman-hatred that tinges all aspects of our lives? It is not the anger of other women that will destroy us but our refusals to stand still, to listen to its rhythms, to learn within it, to move beyond the manner of presentation to the substance, to tap that anger as an important source of empowerment. I cannot hide my anger to spare you guilt."
"What woman here is so enamored of her own oppression that she cannot see her heelprint upon another woman‘s face?"
"There is a pretense to homogeneity of experience covered by the word sisterhood that does not in fact exist."
"As women, we have been taught either to ignore our differences, or to view them as causes for separation and suspicion rather than as forces for change. Without community there is no liberation […], but community must not mean a shedding of our differences, nor the pathetic pretense that these differences do not exist. […] It is learning how to take our differences and make them strengths. For the master‘s tools will never dismantle the master‘s house."
I sincerely encourage everybody to read these essays themselves and learn from them, to open their minds to the various ways in which peoples are oppressed in our world, to the enriching differences waiting to be acknowledged, to the creation of a fuller future. "To refuse to participate in the shaping of our future is to give it up." I refuse to give it up, I reject the silence imposed upon me, and so should you. Because "I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own. And I am not free as long as one person of Color remains chained. Nor is any one of you."
To close what is certainly my longest review on Goodreads to date, this is a vision to fight for, as outspokenly and differently and proudly as we can: "I work for a time when women with women, women with men, men with men, all share the work of a world that does not barter bread or self for obedience, nor beauty, nor love. And in that world we will raise our children free to choose how best to fulfill themselves."
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
I usually don’t really like reading books of essays but this was soo good and beautiful and thoughtful. I can’t wait to read more by Audre Lorde.
‘Divide and conquer must become define and empower'.
- 'The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House'.
'homophobia',
'women of color',
'heterosexism’,
'cancellation',
‘I had decided never again to speak to white women about racism.’
All these phrases are in this book, evidence that they were being used in the 1970s.
- 'The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House'.
'homophobia',
'women of color',
'heterosexism’,
'cancellation',
‘I had decided never again to speak to white women about racism.’
All these phrases are in this book, evidence that they were being used in the 1970s.