Open Ended Questions-American Equal Rights Association Speech

1. The text is a speech delivered to the American Equal Rights Association. What can
readers infer about the audience from the name of the association? What does Truth
say about the audience?

2. Sojourner Truth begins her speech "My friends, I am rejoiced that you are glad, but I
don't know how you will feel when I get through." What does she mean by this, and how
does it reflect the purpose of her argument?

3. Is Sojourner Truth rejoicing over the outcome of the war? Why or why not?

4. What does the author suggest when she says this about slavery: "I want it root and
branch destroyed"?

5. List text that illustrates a distinction between Truth and her audience in paragraph 1.
Why does Truth point out this difference? How might it compel an audience to react?

6. List the two reasons Truth says women ought to "have their rights." What is Sojourner
Truth's main claim? How do these reasons support her argument?

7. Why is this sentence effective in the speech? "There is a great stir about colored men
getting their rights, but not a word about the colored women; and if colored men get
their rights, and not colored women theirs, you see the colored men will be masters over
the women, and it will be just as bad as before."

8. Based on this sentence, what can the reader infer about the author's intentions? "So I
am for keeping the thing going while things are stirring; because if we wait till it is still, it
will take a great while to get it going again."