The Making of the Political Woman

On Jailed for Freedom:

How do we contextualize the suffragist movement considering that almost all of the faces of the women’s suffrage movement are white or at the very least white-passing?

“"We knew somethin' was goin' to happen," said one negro girl, "because Monday the close we had on wer' took off us an' we were giv' these old patched ones. We wuz told they wanted to take `stock,’ but we heard they wuz bein' washed fo' you-all suff'agettes."

We doubted the seriousness of this threat of thrashing until one of the girls confided to us that such outrages happened often. We afterward obtained proof of these brutalities.” (Stevens, 113)

Racism was institutionalized and used to divide the working class and fragment political movements, like the women’s suffrage movement. These movements have consistently internalized these fragmentations:

“Susan B. Anthony, who stated, “I will cut off this right arm of mine before I will ever work or demand the ballot for the Negro and not the woman.” (source)

The political woman was first established as a middle-class white woman. Jailed for Freedom reveals the disparities of the political woman at the time of the suffragist movement. The women in this exhibition demonstrate the diversity of womanhood and particularly the diversity of political womanhood. They also are actively making space for women as a collective, rather than some of the original suffragists who were only interested in making space for themselves-- themselves being cisgender, straight, middle-class white women.This exhibition highlights three women that were constantly making space for all women, women that aligned with their identities and those beyond.