African American Women\u27s Sisterhood Found in Political Organization: Perspectives from the Late Nineteenth-Century United States

This paper shows that despite being excluded from white women’s sisterhood, African American women created their own sisterhood through the formation of political organizations in the nineteenth century. While reading about how Southern White women bonded over and created a sisterhood around their mutual distaste for African American women and the woman’s sphere, I realized African American women had to create their own sisterhood. Through research into sources such as cartoons, poem books, and suffrage convention minutes, I found that the majority of their sisterhood revolved around the creation of suffrage political organizations. I began by researching Southern White sisterhood and found that they also bonded through suffrage organizations. However, they continued to exclude African American women from these organizations. I then moved on to African American Suffrage organizations and found that a sisterhood was created through these organizations. After explaining both sides, I analyzed why sisterhood was crucial for the suffrage movement for African American women and why the suffrage movement was crucial for creating an African American sisterhood. This project contributes to my field of study, the African American Studies Program, by showing that African American women rose above the ostracization and created a sisterhood that did not revolve around slavery. Throughout my studies, I’ve learned about white sisterhood and the white woman’s sphere. I’ve also learned about African American women creating a sisterhood through slavery by watching each other’s children while the mother was working. However, I never read or learned about how this sisterhood evolved after the abolition of slavery. My research shows that these women did not let the oppression of slavery negatively impact their inner societies like sisterhood, which is what previous research suggests