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Decolonising My Body

byAfua Hirsch

On Ancestry, Tradition and Cultural Reinvention

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‘Exceptionally rich, inspiring, challenging’ Bernardine Evaristo | ‘Something on every page that you didn't know before’ Sathnam Sanghera | ‘Celebrates women how they are, as they are’ | Gillian Anderson

Our bodies tell our story. This powerful global history of beauty by Sunday Times bestselling Brit(tish) author Afua Hirsch dismantles the colonial falsehoods that shape our sense of belonging and celebrates the pioneering stories and ideas of women from marginalised groups.

‘A remarkable journey to unlearn western beauty standards and explore ancestral skin, hair and body modification rituals’ Funmi Fetto, Observer

‘A vital, challenging account of reassessing body image beyond the colonial, patriarchal gaze’ I newspaper

‘A generous offering, and a joy filled testimony’ Nana Darkoa Sekyiamah, author of The Sex Lives of African Women

Exceptionally rich, inspiring, challenging, wise and moving. I didn't realise I needed this book until I read it and felt stirrings towards my own ancestral awakening of African female cultural beliefs and practices that were sadly long ago lost to the colonial project. This is a ground-breaking book that speaks to all women.

Bernardine Evaristo, author of 'Girl, Woman, Other'

About Afua Hirsch

Afua Hirsch is a writer, filmmaker, and journalist. She is the author of Brit(ish), the Sunday Times bestseller that explores Britishness, identity and belonging, for which she was awarded the Royal Society of Literature Jerwood Prize for Non-Fiction. She co-presented Enslaved, a 6-part series about the transatlantic slave trade with Samuel L Jackson. She is the presenter of the Audible podcast series We Need To Talk About the British Empire, and Africa Rising, an ongoing flagship series about art and culture for the BBC, through her production company Born in Me Productions. She is a longtime columnist for the Guardian and is a professor of journalism at the University of Southern California.
Details
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • ISBN: 9781529954197
  • Length: 240 pages
  • Price: £10.99
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