Womanhood a Vital Element in the Regeneration and Progress of a Race
By: Anna Julia Cooper
Questions:
Historical Relevance:
Reconstruction
Reform Movements of the 1800s
Author's Info:
Unknown Words:
ephemeral
excrescences
amelioration
bounteous
gallantry
Quotes:
Purpose:
The purpose is to argue that the education and elevation of black women are crucial to racial uplift.
Highlights:
Summary:
The women's status and value were determined by Christianity and the feudal system. Old literary works exposed that women should have better roles in society. For change to happen, everyone has to be involved.
Literary Elements:
- Before: How will she prove this argument?
- During: Why did she feel the need to utilize religion?
- After: Did she ever encounter blatant gender discrimination?
Historical Relevance:
Reconstruction
Reform Movements of the 1800s
Author's Info:
- She is one of the first African American to receive a phD.
- She received a scholarship to St. Augustine's Normal School.
- She was a teacher of math and science.
Unknown Words:
ephemeral
excrescences
amelioration
bounteous
gallantry
Quotes:
- "It is she who must first form the man by directing the earliest impulses of character." (pg. 641)- This is very true. We must teach about the principles.
- "Self seeking and ambition must be laid on the altar." (pg. 643)- These two qualities can halt progress.
- "True progress is never made by spasms" (pg. 642)- In order for things to change, the progress has to be continuously made through and through.
Purpose:
The purpose is to argue that the education and elevation of black women are crucial to racial uplift.
Highlights:
- The ideal of women is created from Christianity and the Feudal System.
- Muslims believe that Heaven is not for women.
- To Muslims, heaven is for men where they are promised a virgin.
- The basis of hope for a country is women.
- Chivalry has not helped increase the role of women in society.
- The idea for a better status for women is in the Gospel in the Catholic Bible.
- Old poems and legends present much honor and love for women.
- Church has to appeal to sympathy and love and the feelings of women.
- In order to change things , sacrifice and hardship is necessary.
- Women become who they are thanks to the women directing their character.
Summary:
The women's status and value were determined by Christianity and the feudal system. Old literary works exposed that women should have better roles in society. For change to happen, everyone has to be involved.
Literary Elements:
- Allusion: "Mahomet makes no account of woman whatever in his polity." (pg. 636)
- Genre: "The two sources from which, perhaps, modern civilization has derived its noble and ennobling ideal of woman are Christianity and the Feudal System." (pg. 636)