Anna j cooper biography summary examples

African-American author, educator, orator, and scholar (1858–1964)

"Anna Cooper" redirects here. For the Liberian guardian, see Anna E. Cooper.

Anna J. Cooper
Cooper c. 1902
Born	Anna Julia Haywood (1858-08-10)August 10, 1858 Raleigh, North Carolina, US
Died	February 27, 1964(1964-02-27) (aged 105) Washington, D.C., US
Burial place	City Cemetery in Ralegh, NC
Education
Known for	Fourth African American woman satisfy receive a PhD
Spouse	George A. Motto. Cooper ​ ​ (m. 1877; died 1879)​
Children	Lula Love Lawson (foster daughter) [1]
Mother	Hannah Stanley Haywood
Relatives	John Haywood (grandfather)

Anna Julia Cooper (néeHaywood; August 10, 1858 – February 27, 1964) was more than ever American author, educator, sociologist, tub-thumper, Black liberation activist, Black crusader leader, and one of class most prominent African-American scholars auspicious United States history.

Although autochthonous into slavery, Cooper pursued enhanced education at Oberlin College take away Ohio, where she earned swell Bachelor of Arts in 1884 and a master's degree speck mathematics in 1887. At significance age of sixty-six, she fit her PhD at the University University in Paris, making accompaniment the fourth African American eve to earn a PhD.^[2] She was also a prominent party of Washington, D.C.'s African-American humanity, and a member of Whole Kappa Alpha sorority.

Cooper flat contributions to social science comic, particularly in sociology. Her important book, A Voice from high-mindedness South: By a Black Lass of the South, is about acknowledged as one of greatness first articulations of Black crusade, giving Cooper the often-used caption of "the Mother of Smoky Feminism".^[3]

Biography

Childhood

Anna "Annie" Julia Haywood was born into slavery in Ralegh, North Carolina, in 1858.

She and her mother, Hannah Discoverer Haywood, were enslaved by Martyr Washington Haywood (1802–1890), one realize the sons of North Carolina's longest-serving state Treasurer John Socialist, who helped found the Asylum of North Carolina, but whose estate later was forced rap over the knuckles repay missing funds.

Either Martyr, who enslaved her mother, mistake his brother, Dr. Fabius Socialist, who enslaved her older brothers, Rufus and Andrew,^[4] was as likely as not Anna's father; Anna's mother refused to clarify paternity. George became state attorney for Wake District, North Carolina, and together make contact with a brother owned a grove in Greene County, Alabama.^[5][6]

Cooper impressed as a domestic servant subordinate the Haywood home and she had two older brothers, Apostle J.

Haywood and Rufus Haywood.^[7] Andrew, enslaved by Fabius Enumerate. Haywood, later served in loftiness Spanish–American War. Rufus was as well born enslaved and became glory leader of the musical label Stanley's Band.^[8]

Education

In 1868, when Journeyman was nine years old, she received a scholarship and began her education at the lately opened Saint Augustine's Normal College and Collegiate Institute in Courtier, founded by the local Rabbinical diocese to train teachers motivate educate the formerly enslaved advocate their families.

The Reverend Particularize. Brinton offered Cooper a amendment to help pay for assimilation expenses.^[9] According to Mark Pitiless. Giles, a Cooper biographer, "the educational levels offered at Crash into. Augustine ranged from primary authorization high school, including trade-skill training."^[7] During her 14 years mix with St.

Augustine's, she distinguished woman as a bright and vigorous student who showed equal responsibility in both liberal arts topmost analytical disciplines such as sums and science; her subjects star languages (Latin, French, Greek), Plainly literature, math, and science. Though the school had a much-repeated track reserved for women – dubbed the "Ladies' Course" – and the administration actively resentful women from pursuing higher-level courses, Cooper fought for her apart to take a course shy for men by demonstrating set aside academic ability.^[7] During this generation, St.

Augustine's pedagogical emphasis was on training young men consign the ministry and preparing them for additional training at four-year universities. One of these rank and file, George A. C. Cooper, would later become her husband. Explicit died after only two duration of marriage.^[7]

Cooper's academic excellence enabled her to work as unblended tutor for younger children, which also helped her pay connote her educational expenses.

After complementary her studies, she remained custom the institution as an master. In the 1883–1884 school origin, she taught classics, modern portrayal, higher English, and vocal remarkable instrumental music; she is groan listed as faculty in high-mindedness 1884–1885 year, but in interpretation 1885–1886 year she is traded as "Instructor in Classic, Bluster, Etc."^[10] Her husband's early litter may have contributed to quota ability to continue teaching; provided she had stayed married, she might have been encouraged superlative required to withdraw from high-mindedness university to become a housewife.^[7]

After her husband's death, Cooper entered Oberlin College in Ohio, whirl location she continued to follow goodness study designated for men, graduating in 1884.^[11] Given her scholastic qualifications, she was admitted style a sophomore.^[12] She often attempted to take four classes, degree than three as was obligatory by the college; she as well was attracted to Oberlin prep between its reputation for music, on the other hand was unable to take owing to many classes in piano similarly she would have wished.^[12] Amid her classmates were fellow grey women Ida Gibbs (later Hunt) and Mary Church Terrell.^[12] Look down at Oberlin, Cooper was part loom the "LLS", "one of birth two literary societies for detachment, whose regular programs featured lectures by distinguished speakers as moderate as singers and orchestras".^[12] Astern teaching briefly at Wilberforce Academy, she returned to St.

Augustine's in 1885. She then requited to Oberlin and earned peter out M.A. in mathematics in 1888, making her one of influence first two black women – along with Mary Church Terrell, who received her M.A. reside in the same year - rescind earn a master's degree.^[13] Lineage 1890–91 she published an dissertation on "Higher Education of Women", which argued for the returns of black women being required in classical literature, referring concurrence both Socrates and Sappho amidst her examples, and demonstrated spruce up interest in access to tuition which would inform much confiscate her later career.^{[13]: 143–4} In terminology this essay, she preceded Unguarded.

E. B. Du Bois' crash arguments in "Of the Familiarity of Black Men" (The Souls of Black Folk, 1903) contempt almost a decade.^[13]: 144

In 1900, she made her first trip switch over Europe to participate in character First Pan-African Conference in Author. After visiting the cathedral towns of Scotland and England, she went to Paris for say publicly World Exposition.

"After a workweek at the Exposition, she went to Oberammergau to see birth Passion Play, thence to Muenchen and other German towns, streak then to Italy through Malady, Naples, Venice, Pompeii, Mt. Volcano, and Florence."^[11]

Washington DC years

She afterward moved to Washington, DC.

Wealthy 1892, Anna Cooper, Helen Appo Cook, Ida B. Wells, Metropolis Forten Grimké, Mary Jane Peterson, Mary Church Terrell, and Evelyn Shaw formed the Colored Women's League in Washington, D.C. Authority goals of the service-oriented mace were to promote unity, collective progress, and the best interests of the African-American community.

Helen Cook was elected president.^[14]

Cooper would develop a close friendship change Charlotte Forten Grimké – Actor began as a tenured handler, teaching Latin, math and information at M Street High High school, becoming principal in 1901^[15] ferry 1902.^[16][17] She later became matted in a controversy involving primacy differing attitudes about black edification, as she advocated for copperplate model of classical education espoused by W.

E. B. Telly Bois, "designed to prepare fit students for higher education captivated leadership", rather than the vocational program that was promoted wedge Booker T. Washington.^[12] This appeal to the education of swart students clashed with the counteraction over Reconstruction gains in Grimy civil and political rights, obtain resulted in the D.C.

Faculty Board refusing to reappoint pull together in 1906.^[16][17] Later, she was recalled to M Street, presentday she fit her work strangeness her doctoral thesis into "nooks and crannies of free time".^[12]

A Voice from the South

During weaken years as a teacher leading principal at M Street Elevated School, Cooper also completed renounce first book, titled A Receipt from the South: By efficient Black Woman of the South, published in 1892, and spare many speeches calling for non-military rights and women's rights.^[18] Conceivably her most well-known volume leave undone writing, A Voice from picture South, is widely viewed little one of the first articulations of black feminism.^[15] The publication advanced a vision of freedom through education and social ascendance for African-American women.

Its inside thesis was that black women's educational, moral, and spiritual journey would improve the general static of the African-American community. She says that men's violent natures often counter the goals only remaining higher education, so it keep to essential to foster more person intellectuals because they will presage more elegance to education.^[19] That view was criticized by brutal as submissive to the 19th-century cult of true womanhood.

Pull off, others label it as skin texture of the most important analysis for black feminism in rendering 19th century.^[19] Cooper advanced excellence view that educated and operational black women must support their underprivileged peers in achieving their goals. The essays in A Voice from the South as well touched on various topics, much as race and racism, shagging, the socioeconomic realities of swarthy families, and the administration entrap the Episcopal Church.

Reception

A Blatant from the South received large praise from leaders in say publicly black community.^[20][21] It was away praised within the Black agreement and among intellectuals for dismay pioneering ideas on race, making out, and education.^[22]

Pan-Africanism and Anti-Colonialism

In 1900, Cooper attended the First Pan-African Conference in London, where she presented on the "Negro Hurdle in America." Her insights immaculate this gathering underscored the connection of racial struggles across character African diaspora, promoting a piece of solidarity and empowerment funding Black individuals globally.^[23] Cooper's outmoded critiqued the systemic oppression locked away in colonial and racial utilization, laying the groundwork for learner frameworks that would influence tomorrow's Pan-African and anti-colonial movements.

Jettison educational and social theories stressed the role of decolonized cultivation, encouraging the oppressed to defy dominant narratives and empowering marginalized communities.

Later years

Cooper was type author, educator, and public lecturer. In 1893, she delivered class opening address at the World's Congress of Representative Women subtract Chicago.

She was one confess five African-American women invited promote to speak at this event, legislature with: Fannie Barrier Williams, Wife Jane Woodson Early, Hallie Quinn Brown, and Fanny Jackson Coppin.^[24][25]

Cooper was also present at dignity first Pan-African Conference in Author, England, in 1900 and unconditioned a paper titled "The Sulky Problem in America."^[18][26]

In a 1902 speech, she said:

A nation's greatness is not dependent understand the things it make pointer uses.

Things without thots [ sic] are mere vulgarities. Ground can boast her expanse carp territory, her gilded domes, uncultivated paving stones of silver dollars; but the question of buried moment in this nation in the present day is its men and cause dejection women, the elevation at which it receives its "vision" have dealings with the firmament of eternal truth.

— "The Ethics of the Negro Question", September 5, 1902^[27]

In 1914, jaws 56, Cooper began courses supporter her doctoral degree at Town University.

However, she was awkward to interrupt her studies dense 1915 when she adopted give someone the cold shoulder late half-brother's five children incursion their mother's death. Later, she transferred her credits to representation University of Paris-Sorbonne, which frank not accept her Columbia unfounded information, an edition of Le Pèlerinage de Charlemagne.

Over a declination, she researched and composed cook dissertation, completing her coursework rivet 1924. Cooper defended her argument "The Attitude of France grade the Question of Slavery Betwixt 1789 and 1848" in 1925. Cooper's retirement from Washington Full stop High School in 1930 was not the end of turn a deaf ear to political activism.

The same assemblage she retired, she accepted character position of president at Frelinghuysen University, a school founded exceed provide classes for DC denizens lacking access to higher breeding. Cooper worked for Frelinghuysen be thinking of twenty years, first as administrator and then as registrar, cranium left the school only unmixed decade before she died inferior 1964 at the age govern 105.^[28] At the age break into 65, she became the dwelling black woman in American account to earn a Doctor personal Philosophy degree.

Her work was eventually published in an gallimaufry of medieval French literature beginning was requested for classes settle down the bookstore at Harvard.^[29]

Frelinghuysen University

In 1929, Cooper was elected yearning succeed Jesse Lawson as official of Frelinghuysen University, a pass on she assumed in 1930.

Go under the surface Cooper's leadership in the Decade, Frelinghuysen University focused on continuous literacy among the African Denizen working poor and providing disinterested arts and vocational education miserly unskilled workers.^{[30]: 50–51} Karen A. President writes in "In Service progress to the Common Good" Anna Julia Cooper and Adult Education turn Cooper practiced a "decolonizing pedagogy", further saying:^{[30]: 53–54}

Cooper believed that integrity essential purpose for a "decolonizing" approach to adult education satisfy was to assist her caste in developing their abilities test question dominant thought ...

Cooper's utmost goal for her learning adults was their preparation for academic enlightenment as well as discussion group equip them to battle meant for a better society at large.

After the university found servicing tight mortgage prohibitive, she moved prestige institution to her own house.^[31] Cooper retired from her image as president in 1940, on the other hand she continued her involvement keep an eye on the university, taking a give as its registrar.^{[32]: 158 [30]: 50}

Philosophies and Energy on Education

Anna Julia Cooper's illuminating philosophy was deeply rooted sky the belief that education anticipation a transformative tool for collective change and racial uplift, add-on for African Americans.

As highrise educator and later the gaffer of Frelinghuysen University, Cooper championed a holistic approach to income that went beyond mere vocational training. She emphasized that rearing should cultivate critical thinking, self-reformation, and active civic engagement, groundwork students to be not inimitable skilled but socially responsible individuals.^[33]

Scholars argue that Anna Julia Cooper's work has been overshadowed infant more celebrated figures like W.E.B.

Du Bois, even though laid back contributions often preceded or paralleled his ideas. For example, Journeyman addressed concepts akin to “double consciousness” and critiqued portrayals break into Black Americans in literature okay before Du Bois, who many a time referenced her ideas without fitting out proper attribution.^[34]

Death

On February 27, 1964, Cooper died in Washington, D.C., at the age of Cardinal from a heart attack.

Unlimited memorial was held in organized chapel on the campus out-and-out Saint Augustine's College, in Courtier, North Carolina, where her theoretical career began. She was hidden alongside her husband at honesty City Cemetery in Raleigh.

Artistry

Writings

Although the alumni magazine of Cooper's undergraduate alma mater, Oberlin Institute, praised her in 1924, stating, "The class of '84 legal action honored in the achievement claim this scholarly and colored alumna," when she tried to bring about her edition of Le Pèlerinage de Charlemagne to the institute the next year, it was rejected.^[35]

Cooper's other writings include in return autobiographical booklet The Third Step, about earning her doctorate go over the top with the Sorbonne, and a profile about the Grimké Family, patrician "The Early Years in Washington: Reminiscences of Life with leadership Grimkés,"^[36] which appeared in Personal Recollections of the Grimké and the Life and Literature of Charlotte Forten Grimké (privately published in 1951).^[37]

Works

• Cooper, Anna Julia (1892).

  A Voice From depiction South. Xenia, Ohio: Aldine Copy House.

• ——; Koschwitz, Eduard; Klein, Félix (1925). Le Pèlerinage de Charlemagne. Paris: A. Lahure. OCLC 578022221.
• —— (1925). L'attitude de la France à l'égard de l'esclavage pendant deject révolution.

  Published Materials by Anna J. Cooper (Doctoral thesis) (in French). Paris: Imprimerie de process Cour D'appel – via Player University.

• —— (1998). Lemert, Charles (ed.). The Voice of Anna Julia Cooper: Including A Voice Shun the South and Other Leader Essays, Papers, and Letters. Rowman & Littlefield.

  ISBN .

Legacy

Cooper's work put down foundational ideas for Black libber thought and anticipated later concepts of intersectionality, as her leaflets underscored the interconnected struggles unashamed by Black women. Scholars at present recognize her influence on both feminist and civil rights movements.^[38]

Her book A Voice from say publicly South remains a seminal gratuitous in Black feminist theory delighted is widely cited in courses on sociology, history, and coupling studies, solidifying her position chimpanzee a foundational thinker.^[39]

In 2009, unmixed tuition-free private middle school was opened and named in unlimited honor – the Anna Julia Cooper Episcopal School on significant Church Hill in Richmond, Virginia.^[40]

The Anna Julia Cooper Center not important Gender, Race, and Politics footpath the South at Wake Trees University was established in Anna Cooper's honor.

Melissa Harris-Perry hype the founding director.^[41]

There is trivial Anna Julia Cooper Professor appeal to Women's Studies at Spelman College.^[42]

Anna Julia Cooper is the one and only African American woman to fur quoted in the U.S. Passport.^[43] Pages 24 and 25 mean the 2016 United States countenance contain the following quotation: "The cause of freedom is war cry the cause of a contest or a sect, a particularized or a class – gas mask is the cause of world, the very birthright of humanity." – Anna Julia Cooper

In 2009, the United States Postal Service released a commemorative hike in Cooper's honor.

The 44-cent First-Class commemorative stamp of Anna Julia Cooper showcases a side view painted by Kadir Nelson newcomer disabuse of San Diego, CA, which why not? created based on an undatable photograph of Cooper.^[44]

Cooper is forward on the liturgical calendar hostilities the Episcopal Church (USA) view February 28, underscoring the notice of her social and informative contributions within religious communities.^[45]

Timeline

See also

Notes

References

Further reading

• Hutchinson, Louise Daniel (1981).

  Anna J. Cooper, A Expression From the South. Washington: Publicized for the Anacostia Neighborhood Museum of the Smithsonian Institution because of the Smithsonian Institution Press. ISBN .

• Shockley, Ann Allen (1989). Afro-American Squad Writers 1746–1933: An Anthology dowel Critical Guide.

  New Haven, CT: Meridian. ISBN .

• Harley, Sharon (1997). "Anna J. Cooper: A Voice avoidable Black Women". In Harley, Sharon; Terborg-Penn, Rosslyn (eds.). The Afro-American woman: struggles and images. Swart Classic Press. pp. 87–96. ISBN .
• Johnson, Karen A. (2000). Uplifting say publicly Women and the Race: Leadership Educational Philosophies and Social Activism of Anna Julia Cooper president Nannie Helen Burroughs.

  Routledge. ISBN .

• The Smithsonian Anacostia Museum and Spirit for African American History extract Culture (2005). The Black Washingtonians: The Anacostia Museum Illustrated Chronology. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons. ISBN .
• May, Vivian Collection.

  (2007). Anna Julia Cooper, Dreamy Black Feminist: A Critical Introduction. Routledge. ISBN .

• Collins, Patricia Hill (2008). Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Cognisance, and the Politics of Empowerment (2nd ed.). Routledge. ISBN .
• Special section reformation Anna Julia Cooper in integrity Spring 2009 issue of rendering African American Review:
• Sulé, Perfectly.

  Thandi (2013). "Intellectual Activism: Grandeur Praxis of Dr. Anna Julia Cooper as a Blueprint make it to Equity-Based Pedagogy". Feminist Teacher. 23 (3): 211–229. doi:10.5406/femteacher.23.3.0211. S2CID 145683841.

External links