Basic Information

Anna Julia Haywood Cooper the “Mother of Black feminism” was born on August 10, 1858 in Raleigh, North Carolina. Cooper was best known as an educator, speaker and one of the most influential female Black liberation activists, who brought to the forefront the importance of education in the uplifting of the Black community. “A Voice from the South by A Black Woman of the South (1892) is Cooper’s most well known work, in which she speaks on issues of women’s rights and racial progress.

Background Information

Few details are written about her time as a slave girl including her paternal lineage. It was believed that slaveholder and Wake County landowner, George Washington Haywood and quite possibly his brother Fabius Haywood could have been her father. However, neither Anna nor her Mother, a Black slave woman named Hannah Stanley Haywood, ever confirmed this to be true. Slavery was abolished in 1865, approximately seven years after Anna was born. Due to the abolishment of slavery, Anna J. Haywood unlike most Black girls before her time, would get the opportunity to enroll in school (Kelly, 2012, p. 1).

At the age of nine, Anna’s education officially began. She was enrolled in a newly opened Collegiate Institute in Raleigh NC, focused on educating and training teachers to educate former slave families. The Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina founded Saint Augustine’s Normal School and Collegiate Institute and it was there that Anna showed an outstanding scholastic ability that later fostered her career as an educator. Anna Julia Haywood’s first taste of women’s rights was at St. Augustine’s, in an incident where she had to fight for her right to take a course reserved only for men. Anna persevered and was allowed into the course strictly based on her academic prowess. St Augustine’s Normal School in 1877, was also where Anna met her husband George A.C. Cooper, who later died of an unknown illness two years into their marriage in 1879 (Kelly, 2012, p. 1).

As unfortunate as her husband’s untimely death may have been, it allowed her the ability to further her education as a woman. Cooper was no longer held under the constraints and pressures of “the cult of true womanhood”. The cult of true womanhood called for the domesticity of women, in being full time housewives, mothers who were to be seen and not heard etc. This was a role expected of all women in the late 1800’s into the 19^th century (Sawaya, 2004, p. 1-18).

After her husbands death Cooper was interested in the idea of studying at Oberlin College in Ohio, due to their profound musical reputation. She was a fast learner and with her background as a music instructor and the money earned from tutoring children, she was accepted into Oberlin. She followed through in a course study designed for men and then graduated with an M.A. in Mathematics in 1887. Most notable in her educational timeline was the achievement of receiving a doctoral degree from Sorbonne in Paris 1925. Cooper’s achievement in being one of the first African American women to earn a doctoral degree, inspired her dissertation “L’Attitude de la France l’egard de l’esclavage pendant La Revolution”(1925), which spoke to France’s Attitude towards Slavery during the French Revolution (Moody-Turner, 2015).

Contributions to the First Wave

Anna J. Cooper’s contributions towards the first wave of feminism are evident in her first and published book, “A Voice from the South: By a Black Woman of the South, in 1892. The book was widely known as one of the first publications focused and rooted in Black feminism, hence why she gained the title “Mother of Black feminism”. Anna J. Cooper believed educating and fostering successful Black women would in turn improve the African American community in its entirety. The book however was met with criticism, due to the 19^th century era views on the cult of true womanhood that it was published in. According to the cult of true womanhood, women were to be the face of domesticity, reiterating the point of being seen and not heard in all areas of society. Even though Black feminism and African American rights were at the forefront of her work as a Black liberation activist, Cooper strongly believed in the establishment of feminism being for all. In 1892 in response to this matter Cooper stated, “It is not the intelligent woman v. the ignorant woman; nor the white woman v. the black, the brown, and the red, it is not even the cause of woman v. man. Nay, tis woman’s strongest vindication for speaking that the world needs to hear her voice” (Cooper, 1892, p. 121).

In 1893 Cooper was invited to participate in the World’s Congress of Representative Women Conference, that was to be held in Chicago, Illinois. She was one of five African American women invited to speak: Fanny Jackson Coppin, Frances Harper, Sarah Jane Woodson Early and Hallie Quinn Brown. The World’s Congress of Representative Women was made up of a predominantly white female audience and it was important to have educated women of color like Cooper who were not often represented in public feminism events in America. Cooper and the rest of the African American women invited spoke on the importance of educating Black women, which would in turn build a strong economy and community (Cooper,1892, p. 132-145). Cooper’s hope for feminism was that it would include all races of women especially women of color who were under represented. Included in her speech were suffrage rights for all and a tale of all women’s liberation being tied together regardless of race. In 1896, sadly three years after her powerful speech, the United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of separate but equal facilities for Black and white people. The Plessy v. Ferguson case would prove to be the beginning of the Jim Crow era. However, all was not lost, Cooper’s speech with the help of other prominent African Americans at the time helped provide a legitimate counterargument to such a law being passed. Leading eventually to the end of a heinous Jim Crow era.

In 1900, Cooper attended the first Pan-African Conference located in London England. It was here that she delivered another important paper called, “The Negro Problem In America”, in which she spoke to the state of African Americans, in the wake of America’s boastful country pride (Cooper, 1892, p. 171-174). Cooper also served as a critique of her peers literary work in the inaccurate depictions of African Americans in literature. She was a woman who seemed to understand the importance of not only writing a new narrative on the education of her people but also a voice that called for righting the many wrongs done to Blacks in America (Moody-Turner, 2015, p. 47-68).

“Only the Black Woman can say ‘when and where I enter, in the quiet, undisputed dignity of my womanhood, without violence and without suing and special patronage, then and there the whole Negro race enters with me.”

~ Anna Julia Cooper (Moody-Turner, 2015, p. 51)

Analysis and Conclusion

Anna Julia Cooper’s overall ideology was focused on education being the solution to many of the problems that plagued women in society regardless of race. However, as a Black woman she understood that Black women specifically were having a harder time in post slavery America than their White counterparts. The hardships faced by Black women like herself were due to the systematic oppressions backed by law, that were instilled in America’s education system and society. Cooper’s strength was rooted in her educational excellence and achievements as an African American woman. The experience of being a widow at a young age and persevering with excellence through the barriers of the educational system, has proven to be inspirational for many women around the world. People during the first wave (1848-1920) were not kind to outspoken women, let alone outspoken Black women. Cooper’s unique contribution to the feminist movement offered a resonating and well thought out voice to the plight of the southern Black woman post slavery. Anna Julia Cooper as an educator, author, speaker, Black Liberation activist and a pioneer of Black feminism, challenged the norms and limits of what Black women could achieve in the 19^th century and beyond. Cooper spoke to the realities of racism, sexism and classism in a way that encouraged a unity of people regardless of race. Today, Coopers legacy is honored and memorialized in the United States Passport pages twenty-six and twenty-seven. She is the only woman and African American quoted for her advocacy and views on freedom being a birthright of humanity (Kelly, 2012, p. 1). “The cause of freedom is not the cause of a race or a sect, a party or a class – it is the cause of humankind, the very birthright of humanity” ~ Anna Julia Cooper, (Kelly & Kelly, 2012, p.1)

 

References

Bell, C.M (photographer). (1901). Mrs. A.J. Cooper., 1901. [between February and December 1903] [Photograph] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2016702852/.

Cooper, A. J. (1892) A voice from the South. Xenia, Ohio, The Aldine printing house. [Web.] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://lccn.loc.gov/12002877.

Kelly, K., & Kelly, K. (2012, April 18). Anna Julia Cooper (1858-1964), Only Woman Quoted in Current U.S. Passport. Retrieved April 27, 2019, from https://www.huffpost.com/entry/anna-julia-cooper_b_1282984

Moody-Turner, Shirley. (2015) “Dear Doctor Du Bois”: Anna Julia Cooper, W. E. B. Du Bois, and the Gender Politics of Black Publishing.” MELUS: Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States 40.3: 47-68. Web.

Sawaya, Francesca.( 2004) Modern Women, Modern Work : Domesticity, Professionalism, and American Writing, 1890-1950. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania. Rethinking the Americas. Web.