My space

Gates and Hooks

When Hooks says “talking back” she is referring to a person speaking as an equal to an authority figure but I think she means more than just talking.  After reading her article, talking back seemed like it was when a person of lower status talked, or moved in a way that someone “above them” felt was wrong.  When I say someone of lower status I mean either woman, of another race, or simply of a lower economic status.  The type of talking back that she refers to seems to be culturally imprinted, therefore making them unspoken rules which is why the other women are the ones punishing Hooks for “talking back”.  The idea of talking back is so normal to the women that even though they are being oppressed they become the oppressors.

This idea of talking back is shown in Gates’ article through the fact that some African Americans find their own race “embarrassing.  In Hooks’ article the women do not want one of “their own” to grab attention, or in a way be “loud”.  In Gates’ article he describes the different categories of being loud “speaking too loudly, dressing too loudly, and just being too loudly.  The black community did not like when others of their race would act this way because they felt it was grabbing attention.  The blacks that were embarrassed wanted to blend in, almost as if they were afraid of their roots.  The women in Hooks’ story also wanted to blend in.  It seemed that the women thought it would be too much trouble to stray from the norm of not having a voice.