Aren't I a Woman?

Taylor Cole
AP-English
9-28-09
“Aren’t I a Woman?”
I am very inspired by Sojourner Truth’s “Aren’t I a Woman?” She was very brave to be speaking her mind so thoroughly at this time in history. She is speaking of how African American women get different treatment than white women. Now as we all know back then it was common for black women to be treated of lower class than whites, but Sojourner thought to bring it to everyone’s attention since they we’re trying to stress women’s rights they might as well stress if for everybody including blacks.
She went into detail about how she goes thru daily struggles that white women don’t even have nightmares about. She can handle pain like a man and even eat as much as much as a man or more but she still isn’t even considered a woman. She used pathos and very descriptive words when she told of how she had to watch all thirteen of her kids which she gave birth to almost be sold in to slavery. I felt her pain, she felt as if only God can hear her cries. She doesn’t see how she can go above and beyond for things and still not considered a woman.
I like how she gets straight to the point with facts and continues to repeat her question of aren’t I a woman? I know it has to make people really sit back and think about how much African American woman go thru. She makes the point if white people naturally having the upper hand, and would it be such a burden just to help out the less fortunate for a change. I also like how she flip script on the men who said that women shouldn’t be treated with respect because Christ wasn’t a woman, but it takes a woman to deliver a boy so that it can become a man. I also have a though that they shouldn’t b comparing men to Christ, because just because Christ was a man doesn’t mean that man should be treated like Christ.
As for the re-written copy of Sojourner Truth’s speech, I feel like that was disrespectful. She has her speaking as the typical uneducated black woman. Why does the typical black woman have to talk like an ignorant slave? I think that Sojourner had haters back then because white woman might have been jealous that they didn’t have enough courage to stand up for their rights earlier in the past. I know it is a good argument because she could have presented herself that way. I just can’t believe that she would do something like that, if she had enough respect to stand up for her rights and demand them then I know she had more respect for herself then to go out and speak as if she had no education.