Belonging: A Culture of Place

“We want to know if it is possible to live on the earth peacefully. Is it possible to sustain life?”

This excerpt frames the central existential and ecological question of Belonging. Through parallel structure and repetition (“We want to know […] Is it possible”), hooks expresses a deep yearning for harmony between humans and the earth. It functions as both a thematic thesis and a rhetorical appeal to shared human longing. The phrasing also expresses a tone of urgency and uncertainty, inviting readers to reflect on the possibility of sustainable, peaceful existence within a dominator culture.

“If one has chosen to live mindfully, then choosing a place to die is as vital as choosing where and how to live.”

Hooks’s remark highlights her meditation on place as central to personal identity and integrity, introducing Reclaiming Identity Through Return and Rootedness. The conditional structure emphasizes mindfulness as a moral and existential commitment, extending even to death. By equating the choice of where to die with how to live, hooks elevates rootedness and home as sacred.

“Estrangement from our natural environment is the cultural contest wherein violence against the earth is accepted and normalized.”

Here, hooks critiques the systemic alienation from nature produced by industrial capitalism, introducing her approach to Critiques of Whiteness and Nostalgia in Environmental and Social Discourse. The phrase “cultural contest” positions this estrangement as a battleground of ideologies—one where