I was 11 when I first performed it. I took my place at the famed Gem Theater (pronounced “thee-a-tuhr” for the uninitiated..emphasis on the “a”) on 18th and Vine and spoke the words,

“Ain’t I a woman?”

I would go on to perform it years after that, in different areas and for different reasons, but to the AME community in Kansas City, that particular performance became my signature.

My mother introduced me to this speech turned poem by Sojourner Truth in a women’s poetry compilation under the same name when I was around 7 or so. You see, it was important to her that I not only be proud to be Black and a woman, but proud to be a Black woman.

This is a woman y’all who didn’t let me have anything but Black dolls and would request the gift receipt if friends/family dared to purchase otherwise. This is also the same woman who, as she tells it, drove to “hither and yon” to find the last Black talking family dollhouse in the KC area, and went to Toys ‘R Us’ stockroom to get it.

*she tells this story way better than I do, and whenever she tells it. I imagine a sort of espionage thriller*

All that (and more) said I am unapologetically proud to be a Black woman. And, as I grew older and dove into history and the social sciences, I learned more about the Suffragist Movement. Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton fought for women! And won (us) the right to vote! Though women who looked like me wouldn’t get that right until almost 50 years later. Growing up, it wasn’t really something that was discussed in my house but, became familiar through TV/film and academic lessons. Despite the “Ain’t I a Woman” performances, however, I didn’t think to critically engage the suffragists until college and then began to understand.

“How could women have gained the right to vote in 1920, when Black people (including women) weren’t able until 1965?” I would wonder, oftentimes to myself. It just never made sense to me.

Sojourner Truth gave her speech during the Women’s Convention in Akron in 1851, invited, I assume because she was a steadfast abolitionist and those in power wanted to keep up appearances. Though Sojourner may not have been speaking directly to Elizabeth or Susan in giving her speech, she was speaking directly to their spirit. You see, many white women, including Susan and Elizabeth, would give their lives before letting a Black person have the right to vote (at all) before they had it. For this, they were portrayed as noble and brave. And they were…for white women. This rule didn’t apply to Black women or other women of color. We’d see a repeat in 2nd wave feminism with Betty Friedan’s “Feminist Mystique” and the feminist movement of the time. (It is why I wrote and am editing the “Womanist Mystique.”) Do not take this to mean that I am not a feminist or believe in its ideals. I do. I just believe that it should be inclusive of all women, and not hedged upon white women. Both not only centered but exclusively focused on the realities of, white women. The Suffragists, however, actively worked against the progress of Black women—especially if it meant that we’d receive equal or better treatment than them—an issue that currently exists.

“Ain’t I a Woman” is not simply a poem about Black womanhood, it is a poem that demands you see us as women and acknowledge and fight for our experiences and truths. It is also about men seeing and treating us as such (yes, that includes Black men), so we aren’t as Zora Neale Hurston would put it, “de Mule Uh de World.” I peep what y’all are doing with Michelle Obama’s DNC speech…we never asked to save you, and Kate Rushin already told y’all to stop trying to have us “mediate your worst self on behalf of your better selves.”

So on today, which is a celebration for many women who will undoubtedly wear white and (even if through their teeth) will support the orange cretin’s pardoning of Susan B. Anthony, I instead choose to uplift those women like me, who Susan didn’t consider as she fought for the rights of those who looked like her. Women like Sojourner Truth, Jarena Lee, Ida B. Wells, and countless others, names both known and unknown, including my mother and hers. I salute your work and struggle. Because without YOU, I wouldn’t be where I am.