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263183

Legitimizing the Self: The Hermeneutics of Sacred Texts in Omar ibn Said’s and Jeffery Brace’s Autobiographies

Article

Last updated: 05 Jan 2025

Subjects

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Tags

Literature

Abstract

There has been a resurgence of interest in slave narratives, which are now viewed as an integral part of the American tradition and culture. Many manuscripts are being reinvestigated to reveal the role of slaves in the making of America. This essay adds to this tradition by highlighting slave's use of religious sacred texts to achieve their equality with their oppressors, hence reclaiming their humanity and authorial voice while annihilating the oppressive Christian discourse that justifies slavery. Two texts are examined against a background of philosophical hermeneutics: Omar ibn Said's and Jeffery Brace's autobiographies. Although Said and Brace were contemporaries, they never met and had different slavery experiences and religious backgrounds, they both make similar statements using verses from the Qur'an and the Bible that defy and deconstruct Christian claims that justify slavery. A hermeneutic analysis of the verses they quote reveals how they target the institution of slavery to expose its hypocrisy, discrepancy, and injustices directed towards slaves.

DOI

10.21608/ejlt.2022.152931.1003

Keywords

Jeffery Brace, Omar ibn Said, slave narrative, philosophical hermeneutics, sacred texts

Authors

First Name

Mahmoud

Last Name

Refaat

MiddleName

-

Affiliation

Department of English, Faculty of Arts, Sohag university, Egypt Department of English, Faculty of Sciences and Humanitities at Alquwayiah, Shaqra University, KSA

Email

mrefaat82@yahoo.com

City

-

Orcid

0000-0001-6936-1312

Volume

8

Article Issue

1

Related Issue

35931

Issue Date

2022-07-01

Receive Date

2022-07-27

Publish Date

2022-07-01

Page Start

1

Page End

34

Online ISSN

2314-6699

Link

https://ejlt.journals.ekb.eg/article_263183.html

Detail API

https://ejlt.journals.ekb.eg/service?article_code=263183

Order

1

Type

Research in linguistic and literary studies

Type Code

2,266

Publication Type

Journal

Publication Title

Egyptian Journal of Linguistics and Translation

Publication Link

https://ejlt.journals.ekb.eg/

MainTitle

Legitimizing the Self: The Hermeneutics of Sacred Texts in Omar ibn Said’s and Jeffery Brace’s Autobiographies

Details

Type

Article

Created At

23 Jan 2023