Despite what some students described as a boring start, Karlyn Campbell offered insight into a historical misconception during her speech, “Agency: Promiscuous and Protean,” which she delivered in front of an audience of students and faculty members in Coates Hall Monday.
Ten minutes into the speech, which was part of the Giles Wilkerson Gray Lecture Series, Audrey, a business freshman who did not want to give her last name, said the person beside her had already fallen asleep.
“The beginning was long, informative, and somewhat boring,” Audrey said.
However, she said Campbell’s speech became much more interesting toward the end — particularly when Campbell revealed the famous “Ain’t I a Woman” speech many people believed was delivered by abolitionist Sojourner Truth, was really a white woman’s fabrication.
In Campbell’s speech, which centered on rhetoric, she made references to the famous speech many people believed to be delivered by Truth.
“Truth is known for her rhetorical skills, and while she made references to being a woman in her speech, she actually may have never made the statement ‘Ain’t I a woman,'” Campbell said.
Truth delivered her speech at a convention in 1851.
According to Campbell, Frances Gage published the written text of the speech thirty years later.
“Gage used newspaper accounts to find information about the topics Truth covered in her speech,” Campbell said. “However, she was not actually present to hear Truth deliver her speech.”
Campbell said she has always had an interest in women and gender studies, rhetoric and African and African American studies.
“I came across the Gage text ages ago after reading the works of some African American critics,” she said. “And what I have found is many people do not know that Truth’s speech is a white woman’s fiction.”
Campbell said the speech Truth gave did contain essentially the same information as Gage’s text, but Gage added to it and put more of a dramatic spin on her words.
Campbell’s interest in this subject began when she first started teaching.
She said she faced job discrimination when she first became a college professor in the 60s.
“Because I was a woman, no one would hire me,” she said. “The universities that did hire me had the most diverse enrollment.”
Campbell said she taught students of all racial backgrounds.
“My students demanded what happened in the classroom be relevant to them,” she said.
And this sparked much of the research Campbell has completed.
Casey McCarthy, a communications senior, said he found the speaker to be very knowledgeable.
“I had no idea what her speech was going to be about, but after hearing it I found it to be very interesting,” he said.
Trinell Tassin, a kinesiology freshman, did not attend the lecture but said she was shocked to find out the famous version of the speech was not Truth’s exact words.
“In grade school, they do not tell us that a white had anything to do with the speech,” Tassin said. “However, the speech would not have had as much significance if we knew, and may not have impacted us as much.”