Sojourner Truth: Ain’t I A Woman?
Like Harriet Jacobs, former slave Sojourner Truth (ca. 1797–1883) spoke out against slavery. In her 1851 speech to the Ohio Women's Rights convention, Truth combined her anti-slavery message with an affirmation of the rights of women.
"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 of the North, all talking about rights, the white men will be in a fix pretty soon.
"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!"
As Tough as a Man
"Look at me! 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 13 children, and seen them sold off to slavery, and when I cried out, none but Jesus heard me!
"That man in back there says women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wasn't a woman! Where did Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him!
"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! Now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.
"Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain't got nothing more to say."
Adapted from Scholastic Search, March 1993.
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If You Lived When Women Won Their Rights
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If You Lived When Women Won Their Rights
by Anne KammaThere was a time that girls and women in the United States could not: wear pants; play sports on a team; ride a bicycle; or go to college.
That all began to change in 1848, when American women (and some men) met in Seneca Falls, NY, at the first convention for women's rights held anywhere in the world.
In the familiar question-and-answer format, this installment in the acclaimed If You Lived... history series tells the exciting story of how women worked to get equal rights with men, culminating in the 19th amendment to the Constitution and giving women the right to vote.
Readers find out what life was like for girls in those days and meet the pioneering figures in the movement, including Lucy Stone, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Sojourner Truth, and Alice Paul.
Anne Kamma has written several books in the series including If You Lived When There Was Slavery in America and If You Lived with the Indians of the Northwest Coast, both illustrated by Pamela Johnson.
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books;paperback books;paperbacks | Ages 7-10
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Rosa
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Rosa
Fifty years after her refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus, Mrs. Rosa Parks is still one of the most important figures in the American civil rights movement. This picture book tribute to Mrs. Parks is a celebration of her courageous action and the events that followed.
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Ages 4-8 $16.95
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