Sojourner Truth's "Ain't I a Woman" Essay

The 18th century is considered to have been one of the darkest times in the history of the United States. Minority groups in the country faced a lot of challenges from strict laws, limited access to education and other social amenities, lack of rights to job discrimination. The challenges were predominant, especially among the African American women. The rise of Sojourner Truth came at a perfect time when the public was so blind with regards to the rights of women. Truth quickly rose to fame when she gave a speech at the national women's convention and later became a symbol of suffrage movement fostered towards eliminating all forces that belittle women. Her speech dabbed "Ain't I a Woman?" is considered one of the most outstanding feminism speech of all time. This paper will provide an argumentative analysis of the speech based on different sources and devices used in articulating the points.

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One of the things that made this speech outstanding is the use of several devices. Truth employs several devices in order to reach out to his audience. One of the devices being the use of repetition, repetition in Truth's speech plays the role of a magnifier and an emphasis on critical points within the speech. It is also used as an appeal subject to remind the audience the issue at stake. Robert Michael's analysis on this claims that the intimate revelation of Truth to the audience draws them closer to listen to her story by stating the fact she is knowledgeable in the topic and indeed relates to it directly being a minority member in the country. Her argument begins with the creation of a commonplace that men are able to identify with. She states "Women need to be helped into carriages and lifted over ditches and to have the best place everywhere". With the opening remark, Truth goes ahead to reject the argument by stating that she has never experienced any of the things (Truth & Kennedy, 245). She further goes ahead in her next claims to show her physical capability and her equality to men in order to elicit thoughts of sympathy and credibility. She makes several claims during the speech that are able to grab attention. In her last claim Truth cites the argument on motherhood. She says she feels hurt watching her children separated from her and taken to work as slaves. One thing that stands out in all her claims according to Michael is ending most of her claims with the phrase Ain't I a woman. She uses repetition of the phrase in order to make her claims sink deeper into the hearts of the audience and fell the pain she is going through while making her speech.

Unlike other speakers that address common place directly, Truth rebutting such arguments that seem to be attacking her by asking the audience questions. Although the end product is the same with regards to having addressed such argument, many philosophers claim that Truth's technique was unique and is one of its kinds. During the speech, she asks the audience how many of them had the belief that the intellect should be respected. She also raises the question of religion during the time had certain negative perceptions or interpretations that generally showed women to be weak and vulnerable. In effect, Truth combats the claims strategically and methodically. She first identifies common places that she perceives to be a fallacy and proves that they are indeed wrong. Take for instance Professor Crenshaw's example on this; Truth comes out clear on the fallacy that women should be subject to men because of their low levels of intellectuality (Crenshaw, 45). She directly attacks the fact that most males are well educated than women. She says "if my cup won't hold but a pint and yours hold a quart wouldn't you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full". Crenshaw in his article claims that through this, Truth has successfully shifted her focus from the female audience to the male audience and directly attacks them believing that women were to be oppressed due to their low level of education.

Truth also addresses commonplace arguments that attack her by belittling the powers of those in authority or the men in general. For instance the common Christian belief argument, she calls the clergy that "that little man in black there". Many people have claimed that the statement was disrespectful of Truth and didn't have any honor to the clergy. Truth's fellow feminists, however, tend to think otherwise and claim that the statement was simply a rhetoric statement that she used in properly articulating her argument (Brah & Phoenix, 83). Through the statement, Truth strips the powers of the clergy and the respect the community holds for them even though they continue encouraging women's subordination through their beliefs. Her attack on the clergy is even made out louder when she makes the statement " the clergy says women can't have as many rights as men", cause Christ wasn't a woman! Where did your Christ from? From God and a woman! The man had nothing to do with him.

The statement attacking the clergy can again be analyzed with regards to the use of repetition. He repeats the rhetorical phrase where did your Christ come from to the point that it is impossible for the audience to ignore the question at the back of their mind. Truth, in this case, uses commonplace facts against the commonplace argument. It is not only effective in making her arguments well-articulated but also in backing up her claims with substantial proofs in an area densely populated by Christians. Apart from the use of repetition, rhetorical question and statement Truth also uses the device for eliciting emotional response feedback from the audience.

Truth addresses the hypocrisy that exists in the society and says she is tired of the hypocrisy of whites, blacks, women, and men. By stating the argument on hypocrisy in the society she already incites emotional resentment among the audience.

Hypocrisy holds a negative connotation on the audience and encourages the feeling of the need to take action. She lays out the hypocrisy that exists in her own life. This according to Hook's argument in his analysis makes the audience aware of the potential injustices that are also present in their lives hence should strive to change accordingly. While making his speech Truth is aware that the emotions of the audience are very vulnerable to her arguments which make her capable of manipulating them to her advantage (Hook, 360). Hook claims the technique is rarely found among speakers but very helpful. She grabs the attention of the audience through playing with their emotions and creates the thought of willingness to change. Elements of a good speech should not only be focused on making argumentative attacks on the audience and making clears their failures but should also encompass the aspect of proving a possible solution and the need to change. The speech Ain't I a woman elucidates Truth's vulnerability state that instills the willing to change the minds of the audience. Through the style, the audience walked out of the audience with a high level of self-reflection and thoughts of change with regards to any of their injustices meted against women.

She infuses the use of emotional response with both repetition and rhetorical questions. Through the use of repetition, Truth is able to gunner more and more emotions on the audience in order for them to also feel the need for freedom from discriminations. Emotional response is also created through the drawing of a picture into the mind of the audience and the use of rhythmic repetitions. This technique is also very important in drawing the audience closer to have an experience of your world even if they are not part of it as claimed by Hook, a common sentiment that most philosophers tend to share.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Sojourner Truth's speech is one of the most famous speech .It was very influential and moving and is wildly known to date. The speech led to the rise of many feminists during the time and several movements. The success of the speech is attributed to Truth's use of several devices that rendered it very effective and moving. Such techniques as discussed and analyzed in this paper include emotional response, rhetorical question or even phrase and repetition.

Analysis of the sources

Ain't IA woman? Revisiting intersectionality by Brah, Avtar, and Ann Phoenix

Brah and Phoenix through this article take a look at sexual categorization and how it was addressed through Truth's speech. It majors on the emotional response elicited by Truth. This article is very interesting with regards to how it makes a connection of how Truth's use of emotional response was critical in addressing such categorization

Ain't I a Woman? By Sojourner truth and Amos Paul Kennedy

Amos Paul Kennedy provides his reflective analysis of the speech and incorporates why he thinks the speech was a success in terms of the styles

Demarginalizing the intersection of race and sex by Crenshaw

Crenshaw's article just like Brah and Phoenix concentrates on the intersection of sex and race based on Truth's speech. However, this article does not focus on an emotional response but the use of literary styles in making the speech effective.

Ain't I A Woman by Hooks

Hook provides an argumentative analysis of the speech that makes readers aware of all thoughts and ideas that Sojourner Truth had in mind while making the speech. It again takes into consideration all of the literary styles taken used in the speech and the devices.

Works Cited

Crenshaw, Kimberle. "Demarginalizing the intersection of race and sex: A black feminist.

Brah, Avtar, and Ann Phoenix. "Ain't IA woman? Revisiting intersectionality." Journal of International Women's Studies 5.3 (2014): 75-86.

Hooks, Bell. "Aint I A Woman." ARGUMENT 24.JUL (2012): 534-541.

Truth, Sojourner, and Amos Paul Kennedy. "Ain't I a Woman?." (2012).

critique of antidiscrimination doctrine, feminist theory, and antiracist politics." U. Chi. Legal F. (2013): 139.