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Culture July 30, 2018
The Emma Watson book club showcases several women writers of color whose powerful books provide valuable insights into the female experience.
via Pexels/@divinetechygirlThe Emma Watson book club, “Our Shared Shelf,” features feminist writers who are making an impact in the literary world. Many of them are women of color with powerful stories and perspectives.
Watson may be white and a self-proclaimed feminist, but she’s trying not to be a “white feminist.” Since assuming the role of a Goodwill Ambassador for UN Women in 2014 and delivering a speech to launch the HeForShe campaign, which went viral, Watson’s been anything but idle. She’s traveling the world to meet with leaders and speak about important issues such as child marriage and violence against women. She’s also been working hard to educate herself about the intricacies and intersections of feminism, especially that of gender and race.
In 2016, she started a feminist book club. Created with the intention to educate herself about equality topics, as well as to open the conversation to others, the group has more than 200,000 members on Good Reads. The book changes every two months, with Watson posting quotes and questions to get the group discussion started. Then, she invites the author or someone related to the topic to share their thoughts.
Watson knows her feminism is a work in progress. Responding to critics who called her a white feminist, she wrote a letter to her fans addressing the issue.
She wrote: “I have since learned that being a feminist is more than a single choice or decision. It’s an interrogation of self. Every time I think I’ve peeled all the layers, there’s another layer to peel. But, I also understand that the most difficult journeys are often the most worthwhile.”
From the beginning, Watson’s book club has featured several women of color authors and poets. Some of the books read so far are considered classics, such as “The Color Purple” by Alice Walker and “Mom & Me & Mom” by Maya Angelou. Other books are from up and coming authors whose careers have taken off in the last few years. It’s important to note that these authors were already famous in their own right before their books were featured in the book club. Nevertheless, we can applaud Watson for bringing their stories to a larger audience, then stepping back and allowing their powerful texts to speak for themselves.
Sorry-not-sorry, I couldn’t resist inserting a Hermione Granger GIF here.
Watson chose “Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race” from 2017 for the club’s first book of 2018. Discussions of race and racism in Britain were being led by those not affected by it, inspiring author Reni Eddo-Lodge to blog about in 2014. Later using her frustration in the topic to manifest into a manuscript. The book explains the concept of systemic racism, draws on African American feminist literature and advocates for the teaching of black British history. At the same time, it’s accessible to American and lay readers alike.
Eddo-Lodge is an award-winning, London-based author who was raised by a Nigerian mother. She’s also a freelance journalist who has written for The New York Times, The Guardian, The Independent, The Daily Telegraph, The Voice, BuzzFeed and Vice. She was recognized by The Guardian as one of their 30 most exciting people under 30 in digital media.
“Women Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype” was published in 1992, now also found in Ebook format. It was a New York Times’ best-seller list for 145 weeks and published in 37 languages. The book analyzes myths, fairy tales, folk tales and stories from different cultures to explore the “Wild Woman” archetype of the feminine psyche.
Clarissa Pinkola Estés is a first-generation American of Mexican mestiza and majority Magyar and minority Swabian tribal heritages. She has a doctorate in ethno-clinical psychology on the study of social and psychological patterns in cultural and tribal groups. She’s also a certified senior Jungian analyst, post-trauma specialist and spoken word performer.
The Emma Watson book club also read “Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body” from 2017. Warning: the book contains content that some may find difficult to read. Gang raped at the age of 12, affected her experience of her body and her relationship to food and weight. Affecting her relationships with family, friends, food, gyms and travel because of her size.
Roxane Gay was born in Omaha, Nebraska to a family of Haitian descent. She’s an associate professor of English at Purdue University and a contributing opinion writer at The New York Times. Her collection of essays, “Bad Feminist,” topped The New York Times’ best-selling list.
Terese Marie Mailhot’s first book, Heart Berries: a Memoir from 2018, was selected for the book club within months of publication. It became a New York Times bestseller. Another warning: like Gay’s, the collection of essays deals with heavy issues including abuse. She started the book while she was hospitalized in a mental institution due to having a breakdown related to the abuse she experienced at the hands of her father. A coming of age story written to write her way out of trauma. The book deals with sexual abuse, intergenerational trauma and poverty.
Mailhot is a First Nation Canadian writer, journalist and teacher. Born in 1983, she grew up on the Seabird Island First Nation reservation and was periodically in foster care. She was diagnosed with both post-traumatic stress disorder and bipolar II disorder. In 2017, she became a post-doctoral fellow at Purdue University, where Gay also teaches.
Angie Thomas’ young adult novel “The Hate U Give” was published in 2017 and is inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement. After witnessing a police shooting of her childhood friend, the protagonist, Starr Carter, turns to activism. She must navigate between two worlds, the poor neighborhood where she grew up and the suburban prep school she attends. Reviewers praised the book and encouraged wider readership of the book beyond the young adult label.
Thomas was born in Jackson, Mississippi in 1988. She wrote the novel while earning a BFA in creative writing from Belhaven University. She’s a former teen rapper who cites Tupac Shakur as an inspiration.
