Reviews tagging 'Sexual violence'

Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde

10 reviews

meganpbell's review against another edition

challenging informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.75

Published nearly 40 years ago, this iconic collection of essays, interviews, and speeches by the self-described "black, lesbian, feminist, socialist, mother, warrior, poet" Audre Lorde remains as powerful, impactful, and relevant as ever. Here, in these brilliantly intersectional writings, Lorde confronts sexism, racism, and homophobia, all while inviting us to see the potential for political change in social difference and revelation in the erotic.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Racism, Sexism, and Lesbophobia

Moderate: Racial slurs and Murder

Minor: Cancer, Child death, Death, Sexual violence, Police brutality, Medical trauma, and War

yaoipaddle's review

challenging emotional informative reflective medium-paced

5.0

Very very very good. My copy is full of annotations for quotes I liked, inspiration I found, facts and stories I wanted to look up further, facts I wanted to pull for reference when speaking with others. 

Definitely not a book to just read and put away without Audre's words tying themselves into your brain.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Hate crime, Homophobia, Infertility, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Slavery, Police brutality, Medical content, Religious bigotry, Medical trauma, Murder, Pregnancy, Lesbophobia, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, War, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

mandkips's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Racism, and Sexism

Moderate: Misogyny, Racial slurs, and Rape

Minor: Cancer, Sexual violence, and Police brutality

robinks's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective slow-paced

5.0

What a powerful introduction to Audre Lorde’s words. I read so many lines over and over to let them sink in. There were such meaningful, clear anecdotes and heavy research to support Lorde’s points. This is definitely a collection I will come back to time and time again.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Hate crime, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Violence, and Colonisation

Moderate: Homophobia, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Lesbophobia, Sexual harassment, and Classism

Minor: Bullying, Cancer, Genocide, Gun violence, Rape, Sexual violence, Terminal illness, and Police brutality

linguaphile412's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Hate crime, Homophobia, Misogyny, Racism, Sexism, and Lesbophobia

Moderate: Racial slurs, Rape, and Violence

Minor: Cancer, Sexual violence, Colonisation, and Classism

kennedylamb's review against another edition

informative inspiring reflective slow-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Minor: Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Sexual violence, Xenophobia, Police brutality, and Lesbophobia

now_booking's review against another edition

hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

It feels almost cheeky to give this amazing collection of essays, interviews, conversations, speeches anything less than 5 stars- cheeky in the way that would you rate a story a beloved grandmother tells you about your ancestry and heritage 4 stars? Because essentially, that is what this book is- it is history and politics, economics and geography, we’re called to reflect on sexism and racism, homophobia and heterosexism and above all intersectionality and how all the intersections that breed inequality and injustice are as relevant now as they ever have been. If it’s not 5 stars for me, it’s because sometimes I craved more of the author than her boundaries delivered in this book. This was so excellent that perhaps in the diversity of its composition, I preferred some formats to others- I wanted more than what the scope of this one book promised- I wanted perhaps a book of poems, an autobiography, a book on feminist theory, another on neoliberalism and yet another on history- to know more of this author and her practice and her lived experience. My greed for this book to be more than a patchwork quilt (however gorgeous) of varied content cast me a little adrift at times when reading this.

Every single word in this collection is laden with wisdom- from reminders of the mundane (and even the mundane here is insightful), to the mind-blowingly progressive.  My favourite parts were the bits where Audre Lorde speaks of her life and lends us her stories and personal lived experience to illustrate the concepts she’s putting forth. The opening story where she narrates her experiences as a Black lesbian woman in socialist Russia, to the tidbits she drops about learning from practically babyhood the ranking of a dark-skinned Black woman in society, and about what that would mean for her lived experience as an American and moreover a Black feminist and intersectional activist. When in one of her most famous pieces from this collection, “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House,” she calls on us to acknowledge difference rather than fear it, to face intersectionality head on, to lean into the anger of injustice and the discomfort of speaking up and use it to drive change… chills. She’s everyone’s trusted Aunty in this book- the one that calls you out, tells you about yourself when necessary but also always has her arms open and inspires you. 

I’m not much of a non-ficition reader typically but this collection was so rich with lessons and insights that are relevant to me as someone who is interested in inequality, but also as someone fearful of getting the fight wrong. This book is part instruction manual for understanding the genotype and phenotype of inequality and injustice in America (and to a lesser extent, globally), and part call you action for how all of us as a society can learn to see and acknowledge things and to do better.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Homophobia, Misogyny, Racism, Sexism, Sexual violence, Police brutality, and Lesbophobia

thepassivebookworm's review against another edition

challenging reflective slow-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Hate crime, Homophobia, Misogyny, Racism, and Sexual violence

yunziyinz's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective slow-paced

5.0

these essays are full of genius. it’s worth it to take them in slowly. the critiques of white feminism are still deeply relevant today. her writing on the transformative power of passion, emotion, love will stay with me for a long time and I know I will be returning to this book regularly. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Chronic illness, Hate crime, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, and Sexual violence

greywarens's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Death and Police brutality

Minor: Cancer, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Violence