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assignment 1 Angela Davis

Felix Saldana
Dr. Bullock
WGS 10000 Section 09

Throughout chapter three, Angela Davis discusses how women’s suffrage, and equality in the workforce, had sort of latched onto the anti slavery agenda, allowing the voices of both black and white women to be heard. One example is Elizabeth Stanton, who came from a wealthy family and had advantages as young girl that most didn’t have. Strengthened by her father’s support, Elizabeth crossed the gender barriers at a young age. Learning how to ride horses, studying arithmetics, and Greek, she was the only female that graduated high school in her class. She even went on to study law with her father (1981:53). It seems that Davis wanted to point out how progressive Stanton was in her youth, only to end up like most of the other wealthy white women; a married, middle class, housewife and mother. Davis also points out that it was Stanton’s background that led up to her feelings of oppression and undervalue, as a women. In a letter to Lucretia Mott, Stanton discussed her home life and how disgruntled she felt. Though it sounded more to me, that she was complaining about her “white privilege”, and how not having the help of servants, led her to feel the same feelings of a black slave. Stanton used this moment as a platform to continue the efforts to gain equality for women and slaves by speaking at the Seneca Falls Convention, the nation’s first women’s rights convention. She was even able to convince Fredrick Douglas that women had a right to vote, to which he then became a male voice for all women. I believe that Davis effectively shows that even if helping white woman was Elizabeth Stanton’s initial unconscious agenda, she was able to channel her knowledge and fortitude from her youth and apply it to a greater cause and fight with the anti-slavery movement while attaching her own incentive, the equality of women rights.