Contemporary Love Stories: Love in the Trap, Hookup, and Consumer Culture

Abstract

Abstract:In Lindsey Stewart's work on social goods "akin to freedom," she shows that contemporary traditions for Black freedom and love have the capacity to be both liberating and limiting. This essay draws on Lindsey Stewart's on social goods "akin to freedom" to argue that bell hooks and Cornel West have a too-narrow understanding of freedom and love, so they miss out on practices and spaces they consider too "commodified/materialistic." Through this analysis, a different story about Black people, salvation, and love is told, one that compels us to see a resurgence of spirit work, of ancestral healing practices, in the trap, hookup, and consumer culture.