Summary of "Ain't I A Woman?", Feminism Old Wave and New Wave, andThe Declaration of Sentiments

In 1851 Sojourner Truth delivered “Ain‘t I A Woman?” at the Women’s Convention in Akron, Ohio. In this piece, starts by saying two of the primary issues of the day: the abolitionist movement in the South and the growing unrest of women in the North. Transitioning to the general treatment of women in the day: white women are treated as fair creatures and receive assistance from men. She states that she does work that would be the equivalent of a man but she does not get the treatment different than man even though she does things that men can’t do, such as giving birth to 13 children. The reason given for women to be treated differently from men is that that Jesus Christ was a man. Truth points out that the only way that Christ came into existence was through a woman. She also mentions that Eve was powerful enough to change the world by eating the apple. If one woman could “turn the world upside down all alone” than women as a collective should “be able to turn it back, and get it right side up again!”

Ellen DuBois reflects on the first wave of feminism in the midst of the second wave with “Feminism Old Wave and New Wave.” DuBois compares the first two waves of feminism and highlights that they both arose from other movements, the abolitionist and the Civil Rights movements. During the abolitionist movement, women did a lot of the footwork but did not receive the public recognition or were allowed to make decisions. Sarah and Angelina Grimke were two abolitionists that started to speak out against slavery, to the dismay of many men. The debate on whether women should participate in the movement in the same way as men started, which DuBois credits as the start of the first wave of feminism. Another catalyst of the movement was that Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton were not allowed to participate with or even sit near men during an anti-slavery convention in London. Women hoped to be credited for their efforts after the Civil War, but they were not. The 14^th Amendment was a final push towards the start of the movement. The amendment specifically used the term “male,” not extending rights to both men and women. The 15^th Amendment also did not mention anything about sex, allowing them to remain in the relative shadows. Women then organized so that they would then have their voices heard. DuBois highlights that the second wave started in a very similar way. Women “had crept into even the most radical political movements of the day” (p.3). In both cases women started as part of the political movements of the day and branched off after they did not get the recognition that they felt they deserved.

The Declaration of Sentiments was put forth at the Seneca Falls Conference in 1848. It was signed by both men and women. The format was similar to the Declaration of Independence. The purpose of the document is to highlight the difference in the treatment between men and women. In this, the authors list some of the inequities in rights including the lack of suffrage, the loss of property, and loss of children in case of divorce. The signers and the authors want the rights granted to men to be applied to women “which belong to them as citizens of the United States.”