Compelled by the Spirit

Writing about his personal journey toward feminist and womanist manhood, the author of this chapter revisits his relationships with family members. He records his experience of “patriarchal masculinity and heterosexist battering abuse.” The author attributes his pro-feminist/womanist identity to his mother and what she taught him about her life as a black woman. He states that she would be the first woman to introduce him to the meaning of feminism. As he continues his narrative toward self-transformation—he shares how his college education and his work as a professor and activist in Labor Studies would transport him to a deeper understanding his mother’s life and that of other black/women of color. The author refers to them his “other mothers and soul sisters.” Ultimately, he aims to “challenge males of all ages and (of all races and ethnicities) to open themselves up to the self-transforming power of feminism and womanism.”