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aCTIvITy 2.13
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About the Author
Born into slavery in New York State, Sojourner Truth (1797–1883) became a well-known antislavery speaker sometime after she gained her freedom in 1827. “Ain’t I a Woman” is the name given to an extemporaneous speech she delivered at the Women’s Convention in Akron, Ohio, on May 29, 1851. The speech received wide publicity in 1863 during the American Civil War when Frances Dana Barker Gage published a new version that became known as “Ain’t I a Woman?”
speech
My Notes
Ain’t Ia Woman? by Sojourner Truth
1 Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter. I think that ‘twixt the negroes of
the South and the women at the North, all talking about rights, the white men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what’s all this here talking about?
2 That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps
me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain’t I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain’t I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man — when I could get it — and bear the lash as well! And ain’t I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother’s grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain’t I a woman?
GraMMar UsaGe
Cultural Connections
Notice how Truth’s powerful speech includes the use of grammatical features typical of African American English:
• Use of ain’t for negation in place of am not or isn’t.
3 Then they talk about this thing in the head; what’s this they call it? [member of Example: And ain’t I a audience whispers, “intellect”] That’s it, honey. What’s that got to do with women’s woman?
rights or negroes’ rights? If my cup won’t hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart,
wouldn’t you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full? replace are and were.
4 Then that little man in black there, he says women can’t have as much rights as men, ‘cause Christ wasn’t a woman! Where did your Christ come from? Where did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.
5 If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, these women together ought to be able to turn it back, and get it right side up again! And now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.
6 Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain’t got nothing more to say.
Example: And now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.
• Use of multiple negations
Example: Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain’t got nothing more to say.
• Verb forms is and was
Unit 2 • What Influences My Choices? 141
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