Who was Anna Julia Cooper?
Anna Julia Cooper was an educator, author, activist and one of the most prominent African American scholars in United States history. She gave voice to the African-American community during the 19th and 20th centuries, from the end of slavery to the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement. She is best known for her educational leadership and her groundbreaking collection of essays and speeches, A Voice from the South by a Black Woman of the South (1892).
Cooper—who once described her vocation as “the education of neglected people”—viewed learning as a means of true liberation. Born into slavery in 1858, her life forged a remarkable trajectory as she fought for race and gender equality. She became the fourth African American woman to earn her Ph.D. after transferring to The Sorbonne, in Paris.
Her life spanned an incredible 105 years.
We believe her legacy lives on here at AJC; through students striving to reach their full potential and through those who educate and uplift them along the way.
“My plea is for the sacredness and inviolability of the growing period of the child. Guard it, nurture it, foster it. Give it the one thing needful--time. If it costs sacrifice, it is richly worth it.”
- Anna Julia Haywood Cooper
