Ask AI: Why are there two versions of Sojourner’s speech? In Ohio Women’s Conference: Ain't I a Woman And don't plagiarize it

The two versions of Sojourner Truth's "Ain't I a Woman?" speech exist primarily due to differing recording and transcription practices at the time of its delivery. The first version was published just a few weeks after the speech was delivered at the Ohio Women's Rights Convention in Akron in 1851 by Marius Robinson, a close friend of Truth's and the editor of the "Anti-Slavery Bugle". Robinson's version is considered to be more accurate because he likely had direct access to Truth. The second, often more popular version, was published more than a decade later (1863) by Frances Dana Barker Gage, an abolitionist and women rights activist, who was the president of the convention. Gage's version contains Southern slave dialect, which Truth, being from New York, did not speak, and it is considered as Gage's reinterpretation of the speech for rhetorical and political effect. Both versions of the speech carry the same core message about the intersectionality of race and gender, but they represent different historical contexts and interpretations. Please do remember to properly credit the speech to Sojourner Truth whenever you use it.