#Rupi kuar about rape culture free#

We want to celebrate the work, achievements, and vigour of WOC and also identify some lessons that we can learn and implement into our own lives from these icons.

With little to no recognition and a rare acknowledgement of their achievements, the successes of WOC are too often sidelined and seen as less than.Īnd so, for Women’s History Month, we at GirlDreamer wanted to celebrate some iconic WOC. However, when recognising the achievements and feats of women, WOC are seldom celebrated in the same way. Time and time again, they have shattered stereotypes and broken glass ceilings. Kaur’s poetry should be given the same freedom to be flawed.Women of colour (WOC) are trailblazers and trendsetters. Frankly, the literary world is saturated with white male voices of dubious quality. But to read Kaur’s success as an omen of the death of poetry would be to unfairly dismiss writing that contains bravery, beauty and wisdom. Even the most sincere critique of her work can slide from healthy debate into vicious attack at the turn of a page. Push criticism of her actual writing aside and Kaur is a victim of a toxic mix of snobbery and misogyny.Īs a young woman of colour in a world where white, male delectations are treated as the definitive barometer of taste, Kaur speaks a truth that the literary establishment is unlikely to understand. The last of those qualities perhaps makes her ripe for ridicule: like many pop musicians before her, she commits the sin of engaging with a demographic whose taste is often seen as a byword for bad quality. She is pretty, stylish, unapologetically feminine, and earns a lot of money for writing that appeals to young women. Kaur is the most popular, and arguably the most marketable, of her cohort. The reason might be to do with her mainstream success. These claims aside, the truth is that both writers have hit upon a winning formula: rupturing short confessional pieces with erratic line breaks to share hard-won truths.

Nayyirah Waheed, another young poet who posts work on social media, had accused Kaur of ignoring her messages about the similarities between their work. There have also been plagiarism claims, most notably when her second collection, The Sun and Her Flowers, was announced. But does she deserve a 3,000-word article on Buzzfeed criticising her “for blurring individual and collective trauma in her quest to depict the quintessential south Asian female experience”? Kaur treads a fine line between accessibility and over-simplicity, and often stumbles into the latter. rupi kaur- Guy Mizrahi September 24, 2017Įven if you like her writing, these little jabs at her plaintive voice are spot on: one of Kaur’s actual poems muses “If you are not enough for yourself / you will never be enough / for someone else” and, while that gained 175,000 likes on Instagram, it has the air of the slurred advice you might overhear at the back of a Wetherspoons. Someone telling you they're ordering pizza Their mimicry is often witty, and close enough to Kaur’s formula to sting: examples include “I wanted / Chick-fil-a / but / you / were / a Sunday morning” and “I understand / why guacamole is / extra / it is because / you / were never / enough.”

#Rupi kuar about rape culture free#

Her trademark fragmented free verse makes her easy prey for online sceptics. Her debut collection, Milk and Honey, has sold 1.4m copies – so far – and she has 1.6 million followers on Instagram.īut success often comes with a backlash, and for every ardent fan, there is a sneering keyboard critic. Kaur writes about love, sex, rejection and relationships, all topics common on social media, but she also deals with darker material: abuse, beauty standards, racism. Part of a new generation of instapoets – young poets publishing verse primarily on social media – Kaur, who turns 25 this month, pairs her dreamy, aphoristic poems with doodles reminiscent of those found in the margins of old school books. R upi Kaur has achieved a rare feat for a modern poet: mainstream popularity.