Anna Julia Cooper was a pioneering African American educator, author, and activist. She dedicated her life to advocating for the rights and education of African American women.
Through her work, she challenged racial and gender discrimination, striving to empower marginalized communities. Cooper's contributions to education and civil rights continue to inspire and impact generations.
Anna Julia Cooper was born into slavery in Raleigh, North Carolina, in 1858. Her mother, Hannah Stanley Haywood, was enslaved and refused to clarify who Anna’s father was.
Her father might have been—either George, who enslaved her mother, or Dr. Fabius Haywood, brother of the man who enslaved Anna's older brother, Andrew.
In 1868, when Cooper was 9 years old, she received a scholarship to attend the newly opened Saint Augustine's Normal School and Collegiate Institute in Raleigh. During her 14 years at St.
Augustine's, she proved herself to be a bright and ambitious student. Despite the school initially reserving a special track, called the "Ladies' Course," for women, Cooper fought for her right to take courses typically reserved for men by demonstrating her academic prowess.
Cooper's academic excellence helped her tutor for younger children to support her education expenses. Upon completing her studies, she remained at the institution as an instructor, teaching a range of subjects including classics, modern history, English, and music.
At Oberlin College in Ohio, she pursued coursework typically designated for men and graduated in 1884. In the 1885–1886 year she was listed as "Instructor in Classic, Rhetoric, Etc."
At Oberlin, Cooper was involved in the "LLS", "one of the two literary societies for women, whose regular programs featured lectures by distinguished speakers as well as singers and orchestras".
Returning to Oberlin, she earned an M.A. in mathematics in 1888, alongside Mary Church Terrell, making them among the first black women to achieve this feat.
In writing this essay, she preceded W. E. B. Du Bois' similar arguments in "Of the Training of Black Men" (The Souls of Black Folk, 1903) by almost a decade.
In 1892, Anna Cooper became co-former of the Colored Women's League, which goals were to promote unity, social progress, and interests within the African-American community.
Anna Julia Cooper started her career as a tenured teacher, teaching students in Latin, math, and science at M Street High School. By 1901 or 1902, she had risen to the position of principal.
Throughout her career, Cooper balanced teaching with activism, advocating for civil rights and women's rights through speeches and writings.
During the years, she completed her first book, titled A Voice from the South: By a Black Woman of the South. It was published in 1892, and this groundbreaking work is considered one of the first articulations of black feminism.
In it, Cooper argued for the self-determination of African American women through education and social uplift. She believed that the progress of black women would positively impact the entire African American community.
Her book sparked debate, with some criticizing her views as conforming to outdated gender norms, while others hailed it as a pivotal argument for black feminism in the 19th century.
Despite the controversy, Cooper's advocacy for women's education and empowerment left a lasting legacy in the fight for civil rights and gender equality.
In 1893, Cooper was one of only five African American women invited to speak at the World's Congress of Representative Women in Chicago. There, she delivered the opening address.
She also participated in the first Pan-African Conference in London in 1900, presenting a paper titled “The Negro Problem in America.”
In a 1902 speech, she said: “A nation's greatness is not dependent upon the things it makes and uses. Things without thots [sic] are mere vulgarities. America can boast her expanse of territory, her gilded domes, her paving stones of silver dollars; but the question of deepest moment in this nation today is its span of the circle of brotherhood, the moral stature of its men and its women, the elevation at which it receives its 'vision' into the firmament of eternal truth.”
In 1929, Cooper was elected to succeed Jesse Lawson as president of Frelinghuysen University, a post she assumed in 1930.
Under Cooper's leadership in the 1930s, the university focused on increasing literacy among African American working-class individuals and providing both liberal arts and vocational education for unskilled workers.
Cooper's educational philosophy, described as a "decolonizing pedagogy" by Karen A. Johnson emphasized empowerment and liberation through education.
“Cooper believed that the essential purpose for a "decolonizing" approach to adult education content was to assist her students in developing their abilities to question dominant thought ... Cooper's ultimate goal for her learning adults was their preparation for intellectual enlightenment as well as to equip them to battle for a better society at large.”
On February 27, 1964, Anna Julia Cooper passed away in Washington, D.C., at the remarkable age of 105, from a heart attack.
Her memorial service took place at a chapel on the campus of Saint Augustine's College in Raleigh, North Carolina, where her academic career began.
She was laid to rest at the City Cemetery in Raleigh, leaving behind a lasting legacy of advocacy and empowerment.
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