23.1: Readings by H. Morrison

Comparison and Contrast

When deciding between multiples items or courses of action, we often naturally employ comparison and contrast techniques. Consider how you made your way to this course: did you decide between not going to college and going to college? Once you made that decision, did you then choose between a few different institutions? Hopefully, you had the support and resources to 1) fully understand each option, 2) carefully consider the implications and consequences of each option, and 3) compare and contrast each option against or with the other. While this example is obviously an informal version of comparison contrast inquiries, it more or less follows the same formula.

Typically, when we talk about “comparing” two or more things, we are talking about noting the ways in which the things are similar and how they are different. For this assignment, we are going back to the Latin root word comparatio and understanding the act of comparing to mean exclusively looking at the ways in which things or concepts are similar. “Contrast” here maintains its usual meaning of showing how two or more things or ideas are different.

Our goal for this assignment is to critically analyze two different texts—fully understand each text and their contexts/implications/consequences— and then compare and contrast them. From this process, you will develop an argumentative thesis based on your comparison contrast findings. Your thorough understanding of the texts and your critical thinking skills are vital components of beginning this process.

What’s the point?

The act of comparing and contrasting are crucial entry points into the process of detailed analysis of a subject. In comparing and contrasting two or more things/ideas, we must thoroughly understand, analyze, and critique each item itself, and then we must critically evaluate how they relate to each other and express those differences and similarities.

Texts and Context

“Ain’t I a Woman” Context

On May 29, 1851, Sojourner Truth delivered a speech at the Woman’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio. Truth, a black woman, was an emancipated slave born as Isabella Baumfree in 1797 in New York state. In her mid-thirties, she was promised freedom by her master; when he failed to free her, she fled and created a new life for herself as a preacher and activist (“Sojourner Truth: Ain't I A Woman?” https://www.nps.gov/articles/sojourner-truth.htm).

The speech Truth gave on that day in 1851, and its derivatives, would later be titled “Ain’t I A Woman?” This rhetorical question was not original to Truth: “Am I not a Man and Brother?”, and later, “Am I Not a Woman and a Sister?” has been used since the late 18^th century by anti-slavery abolitionists in the United Kingdom. These rhetorical questions were used to positively assert the humanity of blacks living under slavery.

The white male American abolitionist Marius Robinson attended the Woman’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio in 1851. As an activist, he had worked with Truth, and he published his own transcription of Truth’s speech with his commentary a month later in the abolitionist newspaper he edited, The Anti-Slavery Bugle, on June 21, 1851. That text is reproduced here as “Ain’t I a Woman” (1851 Robinson Version).

Frances Dana Barker Gage, a white woman and fervent feminist, abolitionist, and temperance movement leader, presided over the Woman’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio in 1851: her opening speech for that event introduced Sojourner Truth to the audience. In 1863, some 12 years after the event, Gage published her version of Sojourner Truth’s 1851 speech, reproduced here as “Ain’t I a Woman” (1863 Gage Version). Brezina, Corona (2004). Sojourner Truth's "Ain't I a woman?" speech: a primary source investigation. The Rosen Publishing Group. p. 32. ISBN 978-1-4042-0154-5.

Gage’s version differs significantly from Robinson’s. Perhaps most notably, Gage’s version of Truth’s speech is rendered in a caricature of the speech of Southern slaves. Truth would not have spoken in that dialect: her first language was Dutch, and she was raised in the North. Still, Gage’s version became the standard version of Truth’s 1851 speech.

Pre-reading Critical thinking questions

1. Why was the speech published at all?
2. Why were multiple versions of Sojourner Truth’s 1851 speech written and published?
3. Why did one version, Gage’s, become the standard?
4. What motivated Gage to publish her version? What motivated Robinson?
5. Why didn’t Sojourner Truth write and publish her own speech?

“Ain’t I a Woman” (1851 Robinson Version)

One of the most unique and interesting speeches of the convention was made by Sojourner Truth, an emancipated slave. It is impossible to transfer it to paper, or convey any adequate idea of the effect it produced upon the audience. Those only can appreciate it who saw her powerful form, her whole-souled, earnest gesture, and listened to her strong and truthful tones. She came forward to the platform and addressing the President said with great simplicity: "May I say a few words?" Receiving an affirmative answer, she proceeded:

I want to say a few words about this matter. I am a woman's rights. I have as much muscle as any man, and can do as much work as any man. I have plowed and reaped and husked and chopped and mowed, and can any man do more than that? I have heard much about the sexes being equal. I can carry as much as any man, and can eat as much too, if I can get it. I am as strong as any man that is now. As for intellect, all I can say is, if a woman have a pint, and a man a quart – why can't she have her little pint full?

You need not be afraid to give us our rights for fear we will take too much, – for we can't take more than our pint'll hold. The poor men seems to be all in confusion, and don't know what to do. Why children, if you have woman's rights, give it to her and you will feel better. You will have your own rights, and they won't be so much trouble.

I can't read, but I can hear. I have heard the Bible and have learned that Eve caused man to sin. Well, if woman upset the world, do give her a chance to set it right side up again. The Lady has spoken about Jesus, how he never spurned woman from him, and she was right. When Lazarus died, Mary and Martha came to him with faith and love and besought him to raise their brother. And Jesus wept and Lazarus came forth. And how came Jesus into the world? Through God who created him and the woman who bore him. Man, where was your part? But the women are coming up blessed be God and a few of the men are coming up with them. But man is in a tight place, the poor slave is on him, woman is coming on him, he is surely between a hawk and a buzzard.

Robinson, Marius. Anti-Slavery Bugle. (New-Lisbon, Ohio), 21 June 1851. Chronicling

America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.

<https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/l...21/ed-1/seq-4/>

“Ain’t I a Woman” (1863 Gage Version)

***Content Warning: This version of Sojourner Truth’s speech and Gage’s introduction contain multiple uses of anti-black slurs.***

In A History of Woman Suffrage, Gage describes the situation before Truth gave her speech:

The leaders of the movement trembled on seeing a tall, gaunt black woman in a gray dress and white turban, surmounted with an uncouth sunbonnet, march deliberately into the church, walk with the air of a queen up the aisle, and take her seat upon the pulpit steps. A buzz of disapprobation was heard all over the house, and there fell on the listening ear, 'An abolition affair!" "Woman's rights and niggers!" "I told you so!" "Go it, darkey!" . . Again and again, timorous and trembling ones came to me and said, with earnestness, "Don't let her speak, Mrs. Gage, it will ruin us. Every newspaper in the land will have our cause mixed up with abolition and niggers, and we shall be utterly denounced." My only answer was, "We shall see when the time comes."

…

There were very few women in those days who dared to "speak in meeting"; and the august teachers of the people were seemingly getting the better of us, while the boys in the galleries, and the sneerers among the pews, were hugely enjoying the discomfiture as they supposed, of the "strong-minded." Some of the tender-skinned friends were on the point of losing dignity, and the atmosphere betokened a storm. When, slowly from her seat in the corner rose Sojourner Truth, who, till now, had scarcely lifted her head. "Don't let her speak!" gasped half a dozen in my ear. She moved slowly and solemnly to the front, laid her old bonnet at her feet, and turned her great speaking eyes to me. There was a hissing sound of disapprobation above and below. I rose and announced, "Sojourner Truth," and begged the audience to keep silence for a few moments.

The tumult subsided at once, and every eye was fixed on this almost Amazon form, which stood nearly six feet high, head erect, and eyes piercing the upper air like one in a dream. At her first word there was a profound hush. She spoke in deep tones, which, though not loud, reached every ear in the house, and away through the throng at the doors and windows.

Sojourner Truth’s speech, as provided by Gage:

"Wall, chilern, whar dar is so much racket dar must be somethin' out o' kilter. I tink dat 'twixt de niggers of de Souf and de womin at de Norf, all talkin' 'bout rights, de white men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what's all dis here talkin' 'bout?

"Dat man ober dar say dat womin needs to be helped into carriages, and lifted ober ditches, and to hab de best place everywhar. Nobody eber helps me into carriages, or ober mud-puddles, or gibs me any best place!" And raising herself to her full height, and her voice to a pitch like rolling thunder, she asked. "And a'n't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! (and she bared her right arm to the shoulder, showing her tremendous muscular power). I have ploughed, and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And a'n't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man—when I could get it—and bear de lash as well! And a'n't, I a woman? I have borne thirteen chilern, and seen 'em mos' all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And a'n't I a woman?

"Den dey talks 'bout dis ting in de head; what dis dey call it?" ("Intellect," whispered someone near.) "Dat's it, honey. What's dat got to do wid womin's rights or nigger's rights? If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yourn holds a quart, wouldn't ye be mean not to let me have my little half-measure full?" And she pointed her significant finger, and sent a keen glance at the minister who had made the argument. The cheering was long and loud.

"Den dat little man in black dar, he say women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wan't a woman! Whar did your Christ come from?" Rolling thunder couldn't have stilled that crowd, as did those deep, wonderful tones, as she stood there with outstretched arms and eyes of fire. Raising her voice still louder, she repeated, "Whar did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothin' to do wid Him." Oh, what a rebuke that was to that little man.

Turning again to another objector, she took up the defense of Mother Eve. I can not follow her through it all. It was pointed, and witty, and solemn; eliciting at almost every sentence deafening applause; and she ended by asserting: "If de fust woman God ever made was strong enough to turn de world upside down all alone, dese women togedder (and she glanced her eye over the platform) ought to be able to turn it back, and get it right side up again! And now dey is asking to do it, de men better let 'em." Long-continued cheering greeted this. "'Bleeged to ye for hearin' on me, and now ole Sojourner han't got nothin' more to say."

Gage goes on to describe the scene after the speech:

Amid roars of applause, she [Truth] returned to her corner, leaving more than one of us with streaming eyes, and hearts beating with gratitude. She had taken us up in her strong arms and carried us safely over the slough of difficulty turning the whole tide in our favor. I have never in my life seen anything like the magical influence that subdued the mobbish spirit of the day, and turned the sneers and jeers of an excited crowd into notes of respect and admiration. Hundreds rushed up to shake hands with her, and congratulate the glorious old mother, and bid her God-speed on her mission of 'testifyin' agin concerning the wickedness of this 'ere people.'