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This article concerns bell hooks, a key figure in the contemporary history of the (African) American feminist movement. It seeks to understand how this Black feminist, who grew up in a poor family in a segregated rural area of the South of the United States, came to prominence for her intellectual output. It draws on her autobiographical writings to examine her exceptional trajectory, focusing in particular on her childhood and youth, and using an approach which combines different social relationships (of sex, class, and race).