Primary sourceSpeech1851
Women's Rights Convention Speech, 1851
Sojourner Truth · 1851
The text of Sojourner Truth's own 1851 speech at a women's rights convention, a key primary source for her activism.
Truth's own recorded words at a women's rights convention, a central primary source for her activism.
About this source
What it is
This is the text of a speech Sojourner Truth gave at a Women's Rights Convention in 1851. It is recorded as one of her own works and survives as a transcribed speech.
Why it matters
In the speech, Truth argues for women's equality using her own experience of hard physical labor and strength, challenging ideas about what women could or could not do. It is a core primary source for understanding her voice and her place in both the abolitionist and women's rights movements.
Look closer
- How does Truth use her own body and life as evidence in her argument?
- Why might her being unable to read, but able to speak powerfully, matter for how we understand her words?
- What assumptions about women or about enslaved people is she pushing back against?
This speech is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Sojourner Truth on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.
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