Blog #5

In Sojourner Truth's speech, Aint I a Woman, she talks about the inequalities between white women and black women. She talks about the differences in how white women are treated and how black women are treated. For example, she says

That man over there say a woman needs to be helped into carriages and lifted
over ditches and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helped me into
carriages or over mud puddles or gives me a best place...(Sojournern1-7).

In this part of her speech, she is saying how people always say that a woman should be treated right, but she has never been treated like that. She was not given the same kind of respect that white women were given because of her skin color. It seems to me like a lot of these poems and speeches we have been reading all seem to have something about slavery or freedom embedded in their themes. I think that just that theme in itself shows similar characteristics to the writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson because one of his philosophies is that every person should be free. A famous quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson is "Without ambition one starts nothing. Without work one finishes nothing. The prize will not be sent to you. You have to win it." (Ralph). I think that the meaning of this quote can be applied to this speech because Sojourner Truth is addressing the issue of inequality between women of two different races. In his quote, he says if you do not try, you will not get anywhere. Without people like Sojourner Truth people may not have realized the racism that was taking place throughout society. Throughout her speech, Sojourner Truth compares herself to other women and says that it should not matter what color your skin is, a woman is a woman and they should all be treated with the same respect. She also talks about how some men say that men should have better rights than women because Jesus was a man, but she says that Jesus was born from God and a woman so men should not be superior to women (Sojourner). I think Sojourner Truths speech does a very good job emphasizing the differences between colored women and white women.

Bibliography

"Sojourner Truth's Aint I a Woman Speech!" Women Writers: A Zine. 14 July 1998. Web. 13 Feb. 2012.

"Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes (Author of Self-Reliance and Other Essays)." Share Book Recommendations With Your Friends, Join Book Clubs, Answer Trivia. Web. 13 Feb. 2012.