Abstract
Dubbed as one of the “100 Visionaries Who Could Change Your Life”, bell hooks or Gloria Jean Watkins tries to understand and define love in her numerous works. What makes her definition different from other thinkers is that she combines her own unique feminist theory with Engaged Buddhism to arrive at a framework for love. This paper aims to introduce bell hooks’ feminist theory, her pedagogy and ideas on spirituality, and clarify her notions on love. Through her love ethic theory, one uncovers that love is more than just an act of will with intent and action towards care, commitment, trust, respect, responsibility and knowledge for oneself and the other, but rather also an act of resistance. Since the vision of her feminist theory is to resist the dominant, oppressive structures and systems, one’s engagement in love must lead to such. There may be issues with this love ethic theory though, and this paper discusses them as well.
I try to expand my understanding with love to help build a more nonviolent world.
I vow to live simply and offer myself to the oppressed.
—Sulak Sivaraksa
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Biana, H.T. (2021). Love as an Act of Resistance: bell hooks on Love. In: Hongladarom, S., Joaquin, J.J. (eds) Love and Friendship Across Cultures. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-33-4834-9_9
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