Today in History—May 29: The Speech’s Name Is a Misnomer

On this day in 1851, abolitionist and women’s right activist Sojourner Truth gave her most famous speech, one that has become known as the “Ain’t I a Woman?” speech.

The only problem is that Truth never uttered those words. We’ll get to how the now-famous phrase was falsely attributed to her in a bit. But first, let’s discover a little about Truth and her brilliant—and deeply subversive—speech.

She was born into slavery as Isabella Baumfree in about 1797 in upstate New York and never lived in the South. (That will be important in a bit.) She spoke Dutch as her first language before learning English, and she never learned to read or write.

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She would become Sojourner Truth in 1843, taking a name that meant “traveling truthteller,” one that was indicative of her intellect and broad understanding of the meaning and power of words.

A year later she began speaking out against slavery and for the rights of women.

Which is how, in May 1851, she found herself speaking at the Ohio Women’s Rights Convention in Akron. What Truth said exactly that day is largely lost to history. But in June 1851 Marius Robinson, a friend of Truth’s, published a transcript of the speech in the abolitionist newspaper The Anti-Slavery Bugle. In the speech, Truth is humorous and self-deprecating, asking men at one point, “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.”

What she almost certainly never uttered was “ain’t I a woman?” which comes from an 1863 publication of the speech by Frances Gage, an ardent abolitionist and women’s rights advocate. Gage’s version recreates the speech in a Southern dialect, which Truth almost certainly never used. The repetition “ain’t I a woman?” was probably a well-intentioned literary device for propaganda purposes.

The truth is that Truth didn’t need any literary help.

See for yourself: You can read both versions here.

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