(August 10, 1858 – February 27, 1964)
By Tracy Chiles McGhee
Anna Julia Cooper was a fierce force, defying enslavement, the legacy of racism and the burdens of misogyny. Born into slavery in Raleigh, North Carolina, she transformed the limitations imposed upon Black women into fuel for her relentless pursuit of education and justice.
Cooper regarded Black women as the moral compass of the nation. Her words are still resonate and relevant:
“Only the Black woman can say when and where I enter, in the quiet, undisputed dignity of my womanhood, without violence and without suing or special patronage, then and there the whole race enters with me.”
Cooper’s masterpiece, A Voice from the South by a Black Woman of the South (1892), is regarded as the foundational text of Black feminism. She unapologetically makes the case for Black women’s education, arguing that the world could not progress without our leadership, intellect, and contributions.
Cooper earned a doctorate in 1925 from the University of Paris,Sorbonne at 67, becoming only the fourth Black woman in history to earn a PhD. She was a teacher and the 7th principal at the prestigious M Street High School in Washington, DC, where she fought for a rigorous education for Black students, refusing to accept mediocrity as the imposed standard.
She spent her later years as president of Frelinghuysen University, an institution that provided education to working-class Black adults who were often locked out of traditional learning spaces.
A founding member of the Colored Women’s League, Cooper served on the executive committee of the first Pan-African Conference and made history as the first woman to join the American Negro Academy. She was also instrumental in expanding the racial equality mission of the YWCA and YMCA. Cooper’s life was an unbroken testament to her belief in Black women’s brilliance, shattering barriers while nurturing the next generation by kicking down doors usually closed to Black women.
Her prolific vision is worth enshrining.
“Give the girls a chance!…Let our girls feel that we expect more from them than that they merely look pretty and appear well in society. Teach them that there is a race with special needs which they and only they can help; that the world needs and is already asking for their trained, efficient forces.”
