Born Sept. 25, 1952, and raised in Hopkinsville, Ky., hooks was the fourth of seven siblings born to Veodis and Rosa Bell Watkins. Her love of reading began as a child, and she learned to read and write at an early age. Her sisters, who shared an upstairs bedroom with her, said she would always keep the light on well into the night and would often hear the sounds of her writing or turning a page before appealing to their mother to get her to stop.

Many women around the world—as with these traders in Liberia—work in the informal economy (ImageArc/shutterstock.com)

Irune Aguirrezabal about a new social contract based on meeting the needs of women:

A Seattle-based fund is pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into recruiting women to run for statehouse seats in three states, part of its effort to close the gender gap in American politics.

The group, called the Ascend Fund, announced Tuesday that it has awarded $600,000 to 13 nonpartisan, nonprofit organizations that will work to recruit and train statehouse candidates from across the political spectrum in Michigan, Mississippi and Washington. The groups will receive grant funding of $15,000 to $100,000, with an average award of $50,000.