You’ll be hard-pressed to find something about Emma Watson not to like. She is our beloved Hermione, as well as Brown educated, UN Women’s goodwill ambassador, a feminist, an advocate for equality, and an all around beautiful human being. She started HeForShe.org, a platform that provides advocates for gender equality a place to share their stories, as well as options for how you can take action to further the goal of equality in all facets of living, such as education, health, and politics. In November of 2015 Emma interviewed the education activist and youngest Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai. The respect between these two women as they discussed the issues they were both so passionate about—equality, education, and feminism—was poignant.
Now, Emma has stolen our hearts all over again with her latest endeavor: a book club named Our Shared Shelf. The club, named by her Twitter fans, officially started on January 7, and the first book is by bestseller Gloria Steinem, called My Life on the Road.
By choosing Goodreads (a website dedicated to the love of books and knowledge) as her platform, she is reaching a specific audience: those who love to read, who read frequently, and those who participate in discussions and look for recommendations. She is bringing over her followers from other social media, such as Twitter and Facebook, and exposing them to the absolute joy that comes from reading a great book. She is encouraging open discussion, critical thought, and affirmative action. She is promoting true feminism, crumbling the negative and inherently wrong connotations and denotations that have stigmatized the feminist movement for too long. She is championing the fight for equality by building a community of well informed, motivated individuals.
The power of the written word, backed by the celebrity, the author, the wife, the daughter, the father, and the son and by those whose voices are ringing loudly above the prejudiced, the racist, and the willfully ignorant, cannot be quieted.
January’s book pick and discussion has come to a close, but don’t fret—stay tuned in to Goodreads and Emma’s Twitter to make sure you’re in the know when the second book is chosen.