Blog Post #4-Sojourner Truth

              

 

  I really enjoyed the section on Sojourner Truth. I have so much admiration for her because she was truly an amazing woman. Despite all of the challenges that she faced in her life, such as slavery, she was able to make a huge impact. What’s even greater about her is that she was able to do so with a great sense of humor. Truth was a captivating speaker who was able to get her point across without being truly offensive to others around her.

                I really enjoyed Truth’s speech “Ain’t I a Woman.” In this speech, Truth makes many great points throughout this poem. She focuses on issues that deal with gender, skin color, and social status. For example, Truth states that “That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and have the best places everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, lifted over ditches, or over mud puddles, or give me any best place. And ain’t I a woman (page 1146)?” Although she was black, she should still get the same treatment as white women because she still is a woman. She should not be treated like she is anything less than that. She is able to confront the situation in a way that the topic gets acknowledged, but it is handled in a light manner. She also does a good job at making the point that intellect has nothing to do with “women’s rights and negro’s rights (page 1146).”People’s intelligence have nothing to do with their gender or skin color. Internal characteristics, such as how smart a person is, have nothing to do with external characteristics. Truth wanted people to stop thinking that opinions from people who were black or female held less weight than the opinion of a white person or a male. She acknowledges how important women are and how both Jesus and other people came from God and a woman, which people sometimes fail to remember-“Man had nothing to do with him (page 1146).” People often fail to remember this detail, and it is important because women had so much to do with the creation of life and with carrying Jesus.

                I also really enjoyed Sojourner Truth’s speech, “Keeping the Things Going While Things Are Stirring.” I thought Truth made some excellent points in this speech. I thought she made a great point when she said, “There is a great stir about colored men getting their rights, but not a word about the colored woman; and if colored men get their rights, and not colored women theirs, you see the colored men will be masters over the colored women and it will be just as bad as before.” If black men and women do not get their rights at the same time, then they will continue to be oppressed, only this time it is by people of their skin color. In order for things to get better for all people, they need to be on the same level. If not, someone will always be held back. I also think that Truth has a lot of wisdom because of her old age. Truth lived many years in slavery, and many years with freedom, so she has wisdom on both sides. She is truly an important activist. I also admire her desire to fight for equality, change, and make a difference in the world. She is one of the only women, or perhaps the only women to fight for rights for people at this time.

                Truth’s pieces really made me think. She was an amazing woman. Reading these speeches made me realize how brilliant she truly was. Because of this, I wanted to find out more influential things that she said, so I looked up some of her most famous websites. I found them to be very interesting. If anyone else wants to hear more words of wisdom from Truth, go to this website: http://thinkexist.com/quotes/sojourner_truth/ !

                Throughout this course, I have really enjoyed hearing African American women’s perspectives on different things. It has really made me think because they have had very different experiences. No matter what time frame they are from, they really make me think. I have a lot of admiration for them because they have had to fight that much harder to be successful. It also is interesting to see cultural differences as well.