Speaking of Learning: Education, Epistemology, and the Discourse of the Female Talented Tenth

This article examines the role of education as a heuristic in late 19th-century Black feminist thought as expressed by the six Black women speakers at the 1893 World’s Congress of Representative Women. Against the backdrop of Jim Crow’s rise, these leading members of the “Female Talented Tenth” used ideas and experiences of learning to define their character, demonstrate their potential, and articulate their visions of reform. While prior scholarship emphasizes education as a source of Black women’s empowerment, this article considers the tension between liberal education and racial retrenchment and analyzes how the Female Talented Tenth navigated this conflict in their discourse.