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Sojourner Truth was an American abolitionist and women’s rights activist. Born into slavery in Ulster County, New York, around 1797, Truth (born Isabella Baumfree) later made her way to freedom in 1826 after an abolitionist family bought her and her infant daughter out of slavery. In 1843, she adopted the name Sojourner Truth for the first time and began traveling the United States, giving speeches about the urgency of the abolition and women’s rights movement. There was some crossover between the two movements—but many white first-wave feminists did not feel too concerned with the issue of abolition. In her landmark speech, “Ain’t I a Woman?” Truth pointed out the racism that existed within the women’s rights movement of her day; the hypocrisy of men who sought to keep women out of the public sphere; and the corruption of the Christian Church, which often used harmful rhetoric to justify the mistreatment and exclusion of women of all races. Truth’s speech, though brief, became famous for its raw emotionality and its critique of the Church. While historians generally agree that the version of the speech that is best-known today was heavily edited by the white feminist Frances Gage, Truth’s speech has nonetheless become a vital piece of feminist history and one of the most important pieces of rhetoric from the first wave of feminism in the United States. By invoking poignant symbols and imagery (such as the fabled “thirteen children” she bore while enslaved, a fact that historians have since debunked and now attribute to Gage’s flawed transcript of the speech), Truth communicates the profound injustices that American women were facing. Truth called attention to the need for an intersectional feminism (though she did not use those words) that recognized the equality of women of all races and demanded abolition, suffrage, and reparations for enslaved Black women.
Sojourner Truth Quotes in Ain’t I a Woman?
The Ain’t I a Woman? quotes below are all either spoken by Sojourner Truth or refer to Sojourner Truth. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Ain’t I a Woman? Quotes
Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter.
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Sojourner Truth (speaker)
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In the opening line of her speech, Black abolitionist and feminist activist Sojourner Truth describes the “racket” within the women’s rights movement that she has come to the Ohio Women’s Rights Convention of 1851 to discuss.
Sojourner Truth notably refers to her audience as “children” as she begins speaking. Truth was a well-known speaker at the time, and, as her name suggests, she sojourned across the country speaking her truth. (She was born Isabella Baumfree but chose the name Sojourn Truth for herself after having a religious awakening). An abolitionist and supporter of the fight for equal rights for women, she was well-known throughout the United States.
The “racket” that Truth wanted to address through her speech was the division within the women’s rights movement. White women were at the forefront of the movement—and while some of these first-wave feminists were devoted to the securing rights for all women, some of them had no interest in supporting Black women or championing the abolitionist cause. This schism was the source of much discord within the movement, and it ultimately led to the creation of two different factions of the movement entirely. Thus, Truth felt that there was something “out of kilter” among her fellow first-wave feminists. She wanted to address the issues within the movement just as seriously as she wanted to address the opposition the movement was getting from the white American men and Christian clergymen who sought to discount and undermine the cause.
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!
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And ain't I a woman?
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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?
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Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights its 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.
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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!
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Sojourner Truth Character Timeline in Ain’t I a Woman?
The timeline below shows where the character Sojourner Truth appears in Ain’t I a Woman?. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Ain’t I a Woman?
...at the 1851 Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, as “children,” Black abolitionist and feminist Sojourner Truth begins her speech. “When there is so much racket,” she says, “there must be...
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...the South” and the women of the North are “talking about rights.” Because of this, Truth predicts, the white men of America will soon “be in a fix.” And yet Truth...
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...into carriages and over ditches—women, these men say, should “have the best place everywhere.” But Sojourner Truth, a Black woman, says that she never gets helped into carriages—no one gives her...
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Truth urges her audience to look at her carefully. “Look at my arm!” she says, urging...
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Truth states that she has given birth to thirteen children—and of those thirteen, she has “seen...
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“They talk,” Truth states, about “this thing in the head.” She asks her audience what the thing in...
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...can’t have the same rights as men because Christ was not a woman. But now, Truth asks her audience rhetorically where Christ came from. The answer, she says, is “from God...
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The first woman that God ever made—Eve—was, in Truth’s estimation, strong enough to “turn the world upside down” all on her own. Therefore, the...
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Referring to herself as “old Sojourner,” Truth thanks her audience for listening to her, then states that she has “nothing more...
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