Influential feminst writer bell hooks dies at 69

Gloria Jean Watson, known by her pen name, bell hooks, died on December 15, 2021, at her home in Berea, Kentucky, where she was a resident professor of distinction at Berea College. She was 69. According to a statement on Twitter by her niece, Ebony Motley, she died surrounded by family and friends. The Washington Post reports that she died of end-stage renal failure.

Born in Hopkinsville, Kentucky, on September 25, 1952, hooks became one of the most renowned feminists of her time. Known for her writing on race, gender, class, and systems of oppression, hooks published more than 40 books. She took her maternal great-grandmother’s name as her pen name and used all lowercase letters to focus attention on her message rather than herself, she told interviewers.

She was also a practicing Buddhist for more than 30 years, often identifying as a Buddhist Christian. “If I were really asked to define myself,