Maria W. Stewart

Maria W. Stewart

Maria W. Stewart (born in 1803 as Maria Miller , died on 17th December 1879 in Washington, DC ) was an American teacher, journalist, campaigner against slavery and women's rights activist .

Life

Stewart was born Maria Miller in Hartford, Connecticut , in 1803 . Her parents, free African Americans , died when their daughter was five years old, and the girl was placed in the care of a pastor and his family. She lived as a servant in this household until the age of 15 without receiving any formal education. Between the ages of 15 and 20, Maria attended the Sabbath school before the Sunday services and developed a lifelong proximity to religious work.

On August 10, 1826, Maria Miller married James W. Stewart, an independent shipbroker, and they were married by Reverend Thomas Paul, pastor of the African Meeting House , in Boston . She adopted her husband's last name and middle initial as well. The marriage remained childless and her husband died in 1829. The estate administrators initially denied his widow any access to the inheritance. However, James had served in the US-British War (1812-1815) and a new law allowed widows of war veterans to receive their husbands' pensions.

Stewart was the first American woman - quite unusual for the early 19th century - to speak to an audience composed of men and women, whites and blacks. As the first African American woman, she gave lectures on women's rights , focusing mainly on the rights of black women, she spoke about religion and social justice towards the black population. Stewart was also the first African American woman to make public speeches against slavery . This all happened at a time when the discriminatory stereotype of Jim Crow as the social image of blacks was widespread in the United States .

Copies of their lectures have been preserved. Stewart spoke of speeches and not sermons despite their liturgical style and frequent biblical quotations. African-American women preachers of the period such as Jarena Lee , Julia Foote and Amanda Berry Smith were undoubtedly influenced by her, and Sojourner Truth later used a similar style in her lectures. Stewart gave speeches in Boston at organizations such as the African-American Female Intelligence Society .

David Walker , a wealthy textile merchant, was a prominent member of the General Colored Association and was a supporter of Stewart. Maria Stewart found an apartment in the house at 81 Joy Street, where Walker and his wife lived from 1827 to 1829. As one of the leading figures in the Afro-American community in Boston, Walker wrote a highly controversial text on racial relations in 1829 under the title David Walker's Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World . In 1830 he was found dead outside his shop. This, and the previous death of her husband, triggered a spiritual rebirth experience for Stewart. She became a vocal and argumentative advocate for "Africa, Freedom and the Cause of God." However, she was much less militant than Walker and rejected any justification for violence. Instead, Stewart advocated a special position, a special bond she saw between God and African Americans. She called for social and moral progress, violently protesting against the social situation of African Americans in various areas of society.

In 1831 Stewart published a small pamphlet entitled Religion and the Pure Principles of Morality, The Sure Foundation On Which We Can Build. In 1832 she edited a collection of religious meditations penned by Mrs. Maria Stewart . In February 1833, she turned to the Boston African Masonic Lodge to give lectures. Her accusation that black men "had neither the ambition nor the necessary courage" caused a commotion in the audience, whereupon Stewart decided not to give any more lectures. William Lloyd Garrison , a newspaper publisher friend and the central figure of the so-called abolitionists , ie the movement for the abolition of slavery, published all the speeches she wrote and gave in his magazine The Liberator and hired Stewart as an author for his newspaper.

She gave her last address on September 21, 1833 in the classroom of the African Meeting House , now known as Belknap Street Church and part of the Boston Black Heritage Trail . She then moved to New York, where her collected works were published in 1835. She taught as a teacher, was involved in the anti-slavery movement and in the literature business. She later lived in Baltimore and finally in Washington, DC, where she became director of Freedmen's Hospital and Washington Asylum , the medical school at Howard University , which was founded in 1867 under President Andrew Johnson as a then all-African American university and initially proposed mainly took care of the care of the African Americans wounded in the American Civil War.

She died on December 17, 1879 in "her " Freedmen's Hospital and was buried in Graceland Cemetery in Washington, DC.

Act

In her writings, Stewart found a convincing account of the deplorable plight of black Americans. She said, “Everyone has the right to speak their mind. Many think that you belong to an inferior race of living beings because your skin is dark in color ... But what right should one worm say to another, 'Hold yourself down here while I rise above you because I am better than you! ‹It is not the color of the skin that defines a person, but the principle that is inherent in his soul."

They believed that only education and religious renewal could lead blacks out of ignorance and poverty. She recommended that they develop their talents and intellectual abilities, lead a moral life and devote themselves to the fight against racism. She urged her audience to emulate the courage of the Pilgrim Fathers and American revolutionaries in calling for freedom. As a practical consequence of her convictions, she founded a school for the children of runaway slaves.

Regarding the legal, economic and social position of African Americans, she emphasized that they were not only subject to slavery in the south, but also to racism and economic structures in the north. At a meeting at which North Americans gathered to criticize and plan measures against the treatment of African Americans in the South, she questioned whether the inhuman enslavement of the South as well as the supposedly normal structures of capitalism in the North were not moral condemn. She stressed that the displacement of African Americans into the service sector was also a great injustice and waste of human potential. She accused the oppression of women in society, but also in the African American community, even in the black churches, where they were relegated to serving positions that posed no real threat to the power structure of preachers, deacons, and other male leaders.

In this way, she anticipated disputes about the intersection of racism, capitalism and sexism, which later had a major influence on the feminist discourse .

reception

The Calendar of saints of the Episcopal Church of the United States of America commemorates Maria W. Stewart with William Lloyd Garrison annually on December 17th.

Stewart's 1831 proclamation

“O, ye daughters of Africa, awake! awake! arise! no longer sleep nor slumber, but distinguish yourselves. Show forth to the world that ye are endowed with noble and exalted faculties. "

“You daughters of Africa, wake up! Rise! Do not sleep or slumber any longer! Show who you are! Make it clear to the world that you are gifted with noble and outstanding abilities. "

inspired the title of Daughters of Africa , an international anthology of texts by authors of African origin, published in 1992 by Margaret Busby in London and New York.

Texts by Maria W. Stewart

• Friends of Freedom and Virtue , reprinted in The Liberator , Vol. 2, No. 46, 1832, Boston, p. 183.
• "A Lecture at the Franklin Hall, Boston, September 21, 1832" in: Early Negro Writing, 1760-1837 , Dorothy Porter (Ed.), Black Classic Press, 1995, pp. 136-140.
• "An Address Delivered at the African Masonic Hall, Boston, February 27, 1833" in: Early Negro Writing, 1760-1837 , Dorothy Porter (ed.), Black Classic Press, 1995; Pp. 129-135.
• "On African Rights and Liberty," in: Margaret Busby (ed.), Daughters of Africa , Ballantine Books, 1994, pp. 47-52.
• Meditations from the Pen of Mrs. Maria W. Stewart: presented to the First African Baptist Church and Society, in the city of Boston . Boston, Garrison and Knapp, 1879.

Literature on Maria W. Stewart

• Marilyn Richardson, Maria W. Stewart: America's First Black Woman Political Writer , Indiana University Press, 1988.
• Marilyn Richardson, "Maria W. Stewart," in: Feintuch, Burt, and David H. Watters (eds.), The Encyclopedia Of New England: The Culture and History of an American Region , Yale University Press, 2005.
• Marilyn Richardson, Oxford Companion to African American Literature . Oxford University Press, 1997, pp. 379-380.
• Marilyn Richardson, "What If I Am A Woman?" Maria W. Stewart's Defense of Black Women's Political Activism, "in: Donald M. Jacobs (Ed.), Courage and Conscience: Black & White Abolitionists in Boston , Indiana University Press , 1993.
• Rodger Streitmatter, "Maria W. Stewart: Firebrand of the Abolition Movement," in: Raising Her Voice: African-American Woman Journalists Who Changed History , The University Press of Kentucky, 1994, pp. 15-24.

Web links

• Literature by and about Maria W. Stewart in the catalog of the German National Library
• BOAF
• African Meeting House , BOAF History
• African History
• Blackseek.com
• New York Public Library
• Lecture delivered at the Franklin Hall, 1832 in google books

supporting documents

1. ↑ America's First Black Woman Political Writer , Marilyn Richardson (Ed.)
2. ^ Maria Stewart, Abolitionist, Public Speaker, Writer , Women's History, About.com.
3. ↑ Ashira Adwoa, Maria W. Stewart ( Memento of the original from April 5, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , African American (December 13, 2010). 
4. ^ Yolanda Williams Page: Encyclopedia of African American Women Writers, Volume 1 . ABC-CLIO, 2007, ISBN 978-0-313-34123-6 , p. 536.
5. ^ Maggie MacLean, Maria Stewart , History of American Women.
6. ^ ^{A b c} Jessie Carney Smith: Black Firsts: 4,000 Ground-Breaking and Pioneering Historical Events . Visible Ink Press, 2003, ISBN 978-1-57859-142-8 , p. 116.
7. ^ Valerie C. Cooper: Word, Like Fire: Maria Stewart, the Bible, and the Rights of African Americans . University of Virginia Press, 2011, ISBN 978-0-8139-3188-3 , p. 16.
8. ↑ DoVeanna S. Fulton: Junius P. Rodriguez (ed.): Slavery in the United States: A Social, Political, And Historical Encyclopedia, Volume 2 . ABC-CLIO, 2007, ISBN 978-1-85109-544-5 , p. 463.
9. ^ David Walker & Maria Stewart House- 81 Joy Street , Boston African American, National Historic Site. National Park Service.
10. ^ Rodger Streitmatter, Raising Her Voice: African-American Women Journalists Who Changed History , The University Press of Kentucky, pp. 15-24, 1994, ISBN 978-0-8131-0830-8
11. ^ Maria W Stewart: District of Columbia Deaths and Burials, 1840–1964 , FamilySearch, accessed June 4, 2012.
12. ^ Maria W. Stewart, Meditations from the pen of Mrs. Maria W. Stewart
13. ^ Maria W. Stewart, Meditations from the pen of Mrs. Maria W. Stewart
14. ↑ Maria W. Stewart, “Why Sit Ye Here and Die?” Before the New England Anti-Slavery Society , September 21, 1832 at Franklin Hall, Boston
15. ^ Maria W. Stewart: An Address , 1833, Boston
16. ^ Maria W. Stewart (ed. By Marilyn Richardson), Religion And The Pure Principles of Morality, The Sure Foundation On Which We Must Build. In: America's First Black Woman Political Writer: Essays and Speeches , Indiana University Press , 1987, p. 30.