Speech Quotes & Evidence
Sojourner Truth repeats this famous 4-word question after describing how she has "ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns."
What is "Ain't I a woman?"
Truth refutes the minister who claims women are fragile by pointing out that no man ever offers her help over this obstacle.
What are mud-puddles?
The biblical figure Sojourner Truth credits alongside God for bringing Jesus into the world without any assistance from a man.
Who is Mary (or a woman)?
The primary rhetorical device Truth uses when repeating "Ain't I a woman?" to emphasize her point rather than seek an answer.
What is a rhetorical question?
The 1851 Ohio convention where Sojourner Truth delivered this famous impromptu speech.
What is the Akron Women's Rights Convention?
When describing her experience under enslavement, Truth states she bore this exact number of children and watched most sold off to slavery.
What is thirteen (13)?
Truth counters the argument that women shouldn't have rights because Christ wasn't a woman by asking where Christ came from, answering with these two sources.
What are "God and a woman"?
The first biblical woman referenced in Truth's argument who was powerful enough to turn the world upside down all alone.
Who is Eve?
The deliberate repetition of "Ain't I a woman?" at the end of successive arguments is an example of this device.
What is anaphora (or refrain)?
The two major 19th-century social reform movements that Sojourner Truth united in her speech.
What are Women's Suffrage and Abolition?
Truth claims that when she cried out with her mother's grief as her children were sold, nobody heard her except this figure.
Who is Jesus?
Truth addresses the argument about intellect by asking if her container holds a pint and another's holds a quart, why shouldn't women be allowed to do this.
What is fill their "pint" measure full of rights?
The two biblical sisters referenced in Truth's speech who besought Jesus and were heard when they grieved for their brother Lazarus.
Who are Mary and Martha?
Truth's comparison between mental capacity ("intellect") and liquid containers ("pint" vs. "quart") functions as this figurative device.
What is an extended metaphor (or analogy)?
Truth warns that between the Black people of the South and the women of the North demanding rights, white men will soon be in this state.
What is "in a fix" (under intense pressure)?
Truth states that no man ever helped her into carriages, over mud-puddles, or gave her any of this.
What is best place?
Truth argues that men should grant women their full rights without fear, because giving women rights does not do this to men's own power.
What is take away or diminish men's rights?
The rhetorical appeal Truth advances by using Christian scripture to dismantle the religious arguments of male ministers.
What is Ethos (or Moral/Religious Authority)?
The shift in Truth's tone from challenging her opponents' logic to empowering her audience can best be described with these words.
What is assertive, passionate, defiant, and inspiring?
The overall central idea of Sojourner Truth's speech regarding human equality.
What is that all women, regardless of race, possess equal capability and deserve full legal/political rights?
Truth argues that if the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, women together ought to do this.
What is turn it right side up again?
Truth refutes the claim that women lack physical capacity by pointing out she could eat as much and work as much as a man, and bear this.
What is the lash?
The ultimate religious message Truth conveys by citing the story of Mary and Lazarus.
What is that God listens to and honors the prayers and cries of women?
The contrast between how chivalrously white women were treated and how brutally enslavement treated Black women highlights this literary element.
What is irony (or societal hypocrisy)?
The historic impact of Truth's speech on the early civil rights and women's rights movements.
What is proving that gender and racial equality are interconnected human rights?