The title of the speech, “Ain’t I a Woman?,” encapsulates Truth’s central argument. At the time the speech was delivered, in 1851, women were said to be less capable than men and thus not deserving of the same civil rights. So, Truth outlines some of the things she did or accomplished, which equaled or exceeded any man, and then asks, “Ain’t I a woman?” In other words, a woman can do anything a man can, and she knows because she did it. She repeats the refrain, “Ain’t I a woman?” four times in the second paragraph of the speech to drive home the point that her capabilities make her worthy of equal rights:

Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain’t I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man—when I could get it—and bear the lash as well! And ain’t I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain’t I a woman? (Paragraph 2)

Throughout her speech, Truth combats stereotypes that women “need to be helped” (Paragraph 2). Truth’s physical strength directly refutes her antagonist’s argument that women are fragile and therefore unfit to vote or participate in society as equals to men. Truth notes that she survived the physical brutality of being an enslaved woman—something that no white man has had to endure. Finally, Truth addresses her emotional strength by mentioning her “mother’s grief” at losing her children to slavery. Truth simultaneously reminds her audience of the inhumanity of slavery—thus advocating for abolition—while also championing the strength of women. She argues that because women and Black people can work, persist, and endure just as well as white men, they should share equal rights.

Truth believes that women’s suffrage and the abolition of slavery can be fought for simultaneously. Detailing her experience as both a woman and a Black American, she reveals the interconnectedness of the two struggles: “I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother’s grief, none but Jesus heard me” (Paragraph 2). As a Black American, she experienced the pain of losing her children to the institution of slavery. As a woman, she felt the grief of separation from her child. Yet most places in the US blocked Black people and women from participating in the political process to change things.

Truth next takes up questions of intellect. She argues that differences in intellectual capacity are irrelevant to the discussion of rights, asking, “What’s that got to do with women’s rights or negroes’ rights?” (Paragraph 3). Truth goes on to use a metaphor of pints and quarts to argue that everyone deserves to be educated to their full potential. She says, “If my cup won’t hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart, wouldn’t you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full?” (Paragraph 3).

Toward the end of the speech, Truth refers to a religious figure whom she calls the “little man in black” (Paragraph 4). This person may be someone in the audience, or the term could refer to religious leaders in general. This person argues that because Christ was a man, men are superior to women. Truth then asks, “Where did your Christ come from?” (Paragraph 4). She answers that Jesus came “from God and a woman” and adds that “man had nothing to do with him” (Paragraph 4). She implies that, because creators are superior to the things they create, religion shows that women are, if anything, superior to men.

Truth continues her religious analysis in the second to the last paragraph, referencing the story of Adam and Eve. In the Bible, the devil disguised as a snake persuades Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, which led God to expel Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden. Truth argues that because Eve “turn[ed] the world upside down” on her own (Paragraph 5), the women fighting for suffrage can metaphorically “get it right side up again” because there is strength in numbers (Paragraph 5).

Slavery would not be abolished until 1865, and women would not win the constitutional guarantee of voting rights until 1920. Yet, the abolitionist and suffragist movements were powerful forces in the US in the period leading to the Civil War. Truth believed that both abolition and women’s suffrage could occur simultaneously, predicting that “white men will be in a fix pretty soon” (Paragraph 1). By “in a fix,” Truth means that white men will soon lose their exclusive grip on political and economic power in the US.