Ivanka Trump, in her new book, Women Who Work: Rewriting the Rules of Success, used a quote from Toni Morrison’s Beloved, and she’s coming under fire for the tone-deaf nature of her quote usage.
The quote from Beloved, a brutal examination of slavery, was this one: “Freeing yourself was one thing; claiming ownership of that freed self was another.”
Trump took that quote and continued on with it in her book by saying, “Are you a slave to your time or the master of it? Despite your best intentions, it’s easy to be reactive and get caught up in returning calls, attending meetings, answering e-mails …”
It’s a shockingly tone-deaf use of a quote that should be about the long psychological history of the worst of humanity.
“Trump’s lack of awareness, plus a habit of skimming from her sources, often results in spectacularly misapplied quotations — like one from Toni Morrison’s Beloved about the brutal psychological scars of slavery,” NPR’s Annalisa Quinn said.
Additionally, author and anthropologist Jane Goodall, who Trump had also quoted in her book, warned Trump to take her words seriously if she was going to use them: “I sincerely hope she will take the full import of my words to heart. She is in a position to do much good or terrible harm.”