Book Review: We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

In December of 2013, famed pop star Beyoncé shocked the world when she released her self-titled album at midnight without any prior promotion. It simply appeared on iTunes and shot straight up the charts, earning the highly successful artist even more accolades. Among the tracks that would come to rule mainstream radio and pop charts for the next several months, there was a song titled "Flawless". Besides featuring the now-iconic lyrics, "I woke up like dis," the song also samples an empowering speech on feminism delivered by the Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. In between heavy bass and pop lyrics, we receive a lesson: "Feminist: the person who believes in the social, political and economic equality of the sexes."

The following year, after the video of the talk had been viewed more than three million times, Adichie published the book-length essay in 2014. The first page of We Should All Be Feminists tells the story that likely stirs the memories of many woman, myself included. She recalls that, at fourteen years old, she was accused of being a feminist. Like Adichie, I too remember getting called a feminist in the same scathing tone a heckler would have hurled the ugliest of insults. The reason I say that she was accused is that, up until very recently, people were not normally encouraged to proclaim their feminists alliances. It was something to not openly admit if you didn't want to scare someone off. Like so many -isms, feminism was (and still is, by many people) considered a radical ideology. When one said, "I'm a feminist," the image most frequently conjured was that of some kind of she-barbarian, standing on a pile of male corpses, underarms unshaven, and waving a flaming brassiere.

Now, in 2017, when we hear the word feminist, we think of Michelle Obama and pussy hats and Emma Watson and women's marches. People no longer hide in darkness, quietly admitting to being a feminist. We shout it rooftops, tweet it in all caps: I AM A FEMINIST.

In Adichie's essay, she provides frank and personal examples of the blatant sexism she has experienced as well as the experiences of friends and colleagues, from the innocuous to the horrifying, and pleads with the world to overcome gender biases. It won't be an easy journey; she explains of her own struggle: "I am trying to unlearn many lessons of gender I internalized while growing up. But I sometimes still feel vulnerable in the face of gender expectations."

The gender expectations she mentions are those that begin from very early childhood, and Adichie points out that this problem of gender inequality begins with the discrepancies in the rearing of boys and girls. Girls are taught to be suitable partners for marriage almost from day one and boys are placed inside the small and unyielding cage of masculinity. Take a walk down the toy aisle of any store: there are toys rampant with domesticity marketed towards girls and nothing like that for boys. She says, "We must raise our daughters differently. We must also raise our sons differently."

I truly believe that everyone should read this book, any age or gender.  If you've never read any other feminist works, don't be intimidated. Consider this an introduction to gender equality, an answer to that question: "Well, why can't we call each other humanists or equalists?" Adichie is eloquent and thoughtful, her rhetoric flowing like that of a friend with whom you discuss a plethora of other issues over brunch, not one of a dull professor reciting a history lesson no one wants to hear. Because of this, Adichie reminds me and teaches many others that feminism isn't a bad word that conjures images of bra-burners but an issue that should be globally addressed, and when that day comes, we'll live in a "world of happier men and happier women who are truer to themselves."