Learning Not to Curse: Swearing, Testimony, and Truth in Olaudah Equiano’s The Interesting Narrative

This article addresses swearing and testimony in Olaudah Equiano’s The Interesting Narrative (1789) by reading the work in the context of a broader contemporary discourse concerning profane swearing and cursing. Acts of profane enunciation inform a number of key episodes in Equiano’s life, and bear particular significance for his spiritual development and abolitionist witnessing. Within the Narrative, swearing is cast as a failure of piety, civility, and humanity, and shown to be actively avenged by a retributive deity. In Britain, profane swearing was also thought to undermine the validity of legal testimony; while, in the British West Indies, slaves were denied recourse to such testimony against their oppressors. By disavowing profane swearing and cursing, the essay argues, Equiano sought to assert both the validity of his oath and the truth of his testimony against the iniquities of the British slave trade.

Overlapping Notions of Self and Other: the Case of the Anabaptist Body

This paper examines the complex interrelations between notions of ͚“elf͛ and ͚Otheƌ͛ with regards to human bodies, taking as a case study the bodily experiences of Anabaptist Christians, both historically and in the present day. It first examines body practices and discourses through the lens of Anabaptist approaches to baptism and conscience and it relates these to the Foucauldian notion of care of the Self. It then looks at biopolitical relations between individuals and the state through an examination of oath-taking and anti-war protests. Finally, it discusses the roles of bodies and bodiliness in contemporary Anabaptist commemorative practices.