ABSTRACT
In April 2009, on the campus of Princeton University in the context of the aforementioned conference on romance fiction and American culture, acclaimed romance novelist Beverly Jenkins read and discussed the prologue from her historical romance novel Indigo. Jenkins evokes Bell Hooks, the renowned theorist and cultural critic on issues of race and feminism in America. Hooks, in the much-cited and reprinted chapter from her book Outlaw Culture entitled "Love as the Practice of Freedom," argues for the political and healing power of love: "The moment we choose to love we begin to move against domination, against oppression. That action is the testimony of love as the practice of freedom." Hooks helps us in All About Love by insisting love is a practice, by which she means we should always think about love as "an action rather than a feeling.".
