29 May 1851
Advocacy / Black women’s rightsBook sources
Sojourner Truth speaks at the Akron women’s rights convention
Akron, Ohio
Sojourner Truth spoke at the women’s rights convention in Akron, bringing a Black abolitionist woman’s voice to arguments over women’s equality. Her speech challenged claims that women were incapable of exercising equal rights.
Dates preserve the source’s precision. This entry is part of a selected historical record; its qualifications and sources are retained below.
Context / qualification
Zinn’s passage follows Frances Gage’s version, published in 1863, twelve years after the speech. Marius Robinson’s June 1851 report does not contain the familiar “Ain’t I a Woman?” refrain. The later version is not treated as a verbatim transcript, and its claim about thirteen children is not adopted.
Sources
- Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States, chapter 6, pp. 124; supplied print pages, edition/year unidentified
- National Park Service, Sojourner Truth; discussion distinguishing Robinson’s 1851 report from Gage’s 1863 version ↗
- Library of Congress, Sojourner Truth’s Most Famous Speech (7 April 2021), speech date and comparison of the 1851 and 1863 newspaper accounts ↗