"Aren't I a Woman"

Sojourner Truth is a Former slave who wrote the speech “Aren’t I a Woman”. In the speech written by Sojourner Truth she makes many errors but in the one written by Frances Gage is written with more understanding. This makes me wonder if Frances Gage wrote his version to help people in the present day better understand the speech or was it written to make Sojourner Truth’s version look uneducated. Both versions of the speech have power and express the words and feelings of an angry black woman.

In the version by Frances Gage uses a lot of punctuations such as questions marks and quotations. His version is more understandable than Truth’s. He explains everything that happens while she is saying the speech. There are actions and movements that she makes and Frances Gage writes down every move she makes. His version helps you to understand how they audience is reacting to her word and how it affects them. The speech talks about how the black women are treated. She starts off by coming at the white men saying how they might feel about men from the south and the women from the north talking about their rights. In the next part she begins to turn the attention not to jus white men but all men. She explains to her audience that she can do just as much as a man can, if not more. She has been through a lot including losing her children to slavery. Men don’t have to birth babies and watch them be snatched out of their hands seconds later.

In the next 2 parts of her speech she talks about religion. People say that women aren’t equal to men because Christ is not a woman. She explains to everyone that Christ was created by God and a Woman who is known as Mary. If it wasn’t for Mary, Christ would not exist. Women have contributed to the world and the religious world just as much as men have. She continues on to say that if one woman who is Eve could turn the world upside down then they could turn it right side up and make women’s rights equal to men’s.

At the end of Frances Gage’s version he described the people’s reactions to her words. Everyone seemed to understand how she was feeling and what she was trying to say. She spoke out for all women including herself and Aren’t she a woman for that.