Representing the West in the Arabic Language: The Slave Narrative of Omar Ibn Said

The autobiography of the West African slave Omar ibn Said is the earliest piece of extant Arabic writing on American soil. Omar Ibn Said was captured as a slave and arrived in the USA in 1807. About twenty-five years after his arrival, he was commissioned to write an autobiography in the Arabic language, which he had studied for religious purposes in his native land. Unlike most slave narratives that have come to light, Ibn Said's is remarkable in that it was written in Arabic, by a Muslim slave who was already literate before his arrival in America. The narrative maintains certain conventions found in the slave narrative genre, such as the humility of the slave author and the practice of extolling the master. Yet the text also evidences Said's manipulation of the language, rendering various readings possible. This is particularly remarkable in a slave narrative, a genre often acknowledged more as propagandistic than as revealing slave identity. Rather than being on the ‘double quest for literacy and freedom’ typical of American slavery, Said is a new representation as the already literate learned slave. This article is an investigation of the form and content of his narrative, and an analysis of some of the key ways in which Said uses form to elucidate or obscure content.