"Ain't I a Woman?" is a speech, generally considered to have been delivered extemporaneously, by Sojourner Truth (1797–1883), born into slavery in the state of New York. Some time after gaining her freedom in 1827, she became a well known anti-slavery speaker. Her speech was delivered at the Women's Convention in Akron, Ohio, in 1851, and did not originally have a title.
The speech was briefly reported in two contemporary newspapers, and a transcript of the speech was published in the Anti-Slavery Bugle on June 21, 1851. It received wider publicity in 1863 during the American Civil War when Frances Dana Barker Gage published a different version, one which became known as Ain't I a Woman?, because of its oft-repeated question. This later, better known and more widely available version was the one commonly referenced in popular culture and, until historian Nell Irvin Painter's 1996 biography of Truth, by historians as well.
Sojourner Truth was born Isabella Baumfree, in 1797 in Ulster County, New York. Truth ran from her master in 1827 after he went back on his promise of her freedom. She became a preacher and an activist throughout the 1840s–1850s.[1] She delivered her speech, "Ain't I a Woman?", at the Women's Rights Convention in 1851. Truth questions the treatment of white women compared to Black women. Seemingly pointing out a man in the room, Truth says, "That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere."[2] In the Gage version, she exclaims that no one ever does any of these things for her, repeating the question, "And ain't I a woman?" several times. She says that she has worked and birthed many children, making her as much a woman as anyone else. Despite giving birth to children just like white women did, black women were not treated with the same respect as white women. Black women were women, but because their race was seen as inferior, being a woman did not mean much if they were not white. There is no official published version of her speech; many rewritings of it were published anywhere from one month to 12 years after it was spoken.
