Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Pearl Cleage

Quote by Pearl Cleage

Work

Just Wanna Testify

Browse quotes and source details for this work. more

Author

Pearl Cleage
Pearl Cleage

Pearl Cleage (born December 7, 1948) is an American author, playwright, essayist, and poet known for exploring themes of race, gender, and social justice, particularly focusing on African American women's experiences. Born in Detroit, Michigan, she grew up in a family active in the civil rights movement. Her works include novels such as 'What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day' and 'I Wish I Had a Red Dress,' as well as plays like 'Flyin' West' and 'Blues for an Alabama Sky.' Cleage is also a social activist who participated in the Black Panther Party and taught at Spelman College. Her writing blends realism with poetic language, often set in African American communities. She has received numerous awards, including the American Book Award, and continues to write and speak publicly from her home in Atlanta. more

You May Also Like

“Numerous patients with eating disorders refuse to eat with their families and friends, even insisting on eating only in private. Many of the practices that are seen as essential for creating and sustaining relatedness - the sharing of food, living together, sexual relationships, and even reproduction - are consistently negated by anorexic and other eating disordered practices.”

WomenMental HealthBody ImageAnorexiaEating DisorderBulimiaPsychopathologyBody Dysmorphia
Book:Eating Disorders: A Contemporary Introduction
Create image

“Each internal representation of the mother has its corresponding self-representation - the first as bad, empty, and guilty and the second as passive, compliant, and good. Working together, these internal objects undermine patient’s journeys toward adulthood, which is compatible with the symptoms and behaviors of the disorder.”

WomenMental HealthBody ImageAnorexiaEating DisorderBulimiaPsychopathologyBody Dysmorphia
Book:Eating Disorders: A Contemporary Introduction
Create image

“One of our central tasks with patients with eating disorders is facilitating the capacity to postpone action in favor of reflection. We inevitably find especially early on, that this is challenging: the pull to binge, or purge, or restrict is difficult, often impossible, to resist. To understand this fact, in this chapter we begin with a discussion of Freud’s (1914) notion of the compulsion to repeat and then formulate the eating disordered patient's symptoms as repetitions against traumatic themes from childhood, never-ending (because never fully successful) attempts to magically undo the pain of the past.”

WomenMental HealthBody ImageAnorexiaEating DisorderBulimiaPsychopathologyBody Dysmorphia
Book:Eating Disorders: A Contemporary Introduction
Create image

“Patients with eating disorders typically report little power to stop their eating disordered behaviors (i.e., reversibility), are often unaware of the thoughts and feelings they have when engaging in them (i.e., self-observation), and, by definition, their behaviors are self-defeating and fail to forward their development in constructive ways (i.e., appropriateness).”

WomenMental HealthBody ImageAnorexiaEating DisorderBulimiaPsychopathologyBody Dysmorphia
Book:Eating Disorders: A Contemporary Introduction
Create image

“We all need to feel safe, that the world is predicable, that obstacles can be overcome, and conflicts resolved -in short, to maintain narcissistic equilibrium. When such conditions are met, infants can pleasurably engage with their environments. When faced with overwhelming experience, internal or external, they must find a way to restore their fragile self-esteem. Some infants, especially when faced with overwhelm that cannot be overcome, turn away from reality and toward omnipotent solution. This learned response feels dependable and, over time, takes on an addictive quality, restricting her access to other solutions and pathways to further growth.”

WomenMental HealthBody ImageAnorexiaEating DisorderBulimiaPsychopathologyBody Dysmorphia
Book:Eating Disorders: A Contemporary Introduction
Create image