The Hybrid Identity of Olaudah Equiano in The Interesting Narrative

This essay explores the hybrid identity of Olaudah Equiano in The Interesting Narrative, his shifting racial identity, and his use of education and religion to raise his social and economic status. It also examines how Equiano's self-portrayal reflects contradictions in racial consciousness, alienation, and identification.

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The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano
, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African
“The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano is Olaudah Equiano” is an
autobiography, told by the person, from his own perspective and as a narrative. The book
describes Equiano's life in slavery. The narrative begins with the kidnapping of by Equiano when
he was a child the by slave traders and later narrates his travels with his master, who is the
captain of a British trading vessel. In later years of his life, he was allowed to carry out minor
trade exchanges and finally buys his freedom with his savings. He works for a scientist in
England and travels as a public speaker.
As an African slave, Equiano is denied identity and the only identity he gets early in life
is of a slave. Equiano gradually develops a hybrid identity as his black consciousness transforms
and identifies with the European culture based on his education, religion, and trade.
Equiano’s African identity
Equiano as an African and a slave has no control over his fate, name, and his movements
in his life. From very early years on in life, he discovers that slavery has restricted his prospects
for self-discovery. However, once he is free, he attempts to discover a real sense of self and
looks for his true identity. He looks for employment, proves his worth and garners respect and
admiration from those around him. He resists any further oppression and violence and converts
to Christianity. He gets involved with the abolitionist movement, once he enters the world of the
British empire. He protests the criticisms made against by him and publishes his autobiography.

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However, the only identity he thinks he can have by identifying with the English and uses
education, religion, and trade to raise his socio-economic status.
The baptismal and naval records in The Interesting Narrative point out that Equiano was
born in South Carolina and he came to England much earlier than he says (Karlberg 9). Thus, the
narration may have invented the African identity rather than reclaim. It can be argued that
Equiano modifies the text based on the expectations of his audience. It could be assumed that
Equiano was aware of reaching out to a broader audience if he adapted the truth of his origins
and several instances. Equiano’s early relation to slavery, his contradictory defense of slavery in
Africa and the necessity of describing his African background shows his efforts to reach a wider
audience (Karlberg 27). His work can be seen as contradictory as he came from a social class
that owned slaves. He became an aggressive challenger of slavery and yet wanted a free flow of
commerce and goods, and some of these goods were those he wanted to be outlawed.
The first two chapters of The Interesting Narrative portray his African childhood, his
kidnapping and his torturous voyage. The experiences work as a primary personal testimony to
the dehumanization under the slave trade. However, critics argue if Equiano’s African identity
was counterfeit as most of his experiences were based on European travel narratives rather than
personal experiences. Equiano’s portrayal shows how cultural memory can impact the individual
and collective experiences of one (Carrigan 27).
A false racial identity
Equiano's self-portrayal in “The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano is
Olaudah Equiano” explores the process of racial adaptation and survival. The narrator is forced
to feel the racial consciousness, based on his alienation and identification with the European
culture. His self-portrayal tries to resolve the psychological dualism because of the denial of the

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Black self and the adoption of the White. He is caught within the binary distinction of black and
white as well as silvery and civilization and develops a false racial identity. It would be wrong to
place Equiano’s deity within the context of colonial and postcolonial perspective as he tries to
create an identity within the notions of self in the eighteenth century. Equiano‟s work can be
seen as a status quo where the slavery not just enslaves the slave but the master as well (Barron
13).
Equiano develops a hybrid identity that blends both African and European worldviews.
One can see the “eighteenth-century black aesthetic” in his work that reflects the formation of a
complex identity that is both African and Afro-British American (Barron 13). As Equiano
attempts to reunite British and African culture culturally, he looks at himself as both African and
British. He seeks promotion of trade between British and Africa with the abolition of slavery. He
mentions how Africa could be incorporated into the British Empire and Africans made subjects
of Britain. In his application and petitions to the British government, he writes in one of his
letters
” I doubt not if a system of commerce was established in Africa, the demand for
manufactures would most rapidly augment, as the native inhabitants will insensibly adopt the
British fashions, manners, customs.” (Equiano 355).
Equiano’s efforts to include Africans in Britain’s economic activities reflect upon his
subjectivity and identity formation. Despite the extremely restraining nature of slave society,
Equiano still manages to fashion identity through a degree of economic autonomy (Barron 15). It
shows that he is aware of the dehumanization under the slave system and wants to end it.

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“Population, the bowels, and surface of Africa, abound in valuable and useful returns; the
hidden treasures of centuries will be brought to light and into circulation. Industry, enterprize,
and mining, will have their full scope, proportionably as they civilize” (Equiano 357).
Equiano shows that how his appeal in terms of commerce would benefit the British
people economically as Africa is a land of "hidden treasures," an "endless field," that the British
merchant could explore.
Equiano‟s practical measures to resist his enslavement and his economic endeavors
reflect upon the economics of slavery. (Barron 28). He shows a sophisticated consciousness to
resist the dehumanization under the slave system and enjoy a degree of economic independence
that allows him to fashion an identity. He undermines the imperialist ideas and at the same time
establishes the open nature of slavery (Barron 33).
His new identity is a fusion of African heritage and British acculturation. Even though he
calls for an end to the slave trade and liberation from the New World colonies, critics note a
tension between his position and views (Barron 35). Even as Equiano condemns racism, he
establishes a superiority of the British national character.
“it lays open an endless field of commerce to the British manufactures and merchant
adventurer. The manufacturing interest and the general interests are synonymous. The abolition
of slavery would be in reality an universal good” (Equiano 357).
His acculturation to Western society weakens his efforts to assert an African identity. His
cosmopolitan outlook supports British imperialism, and it can be seen in his argument on how
the plight of the British poor cannot be compared to that of the slaves. He highlights the

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exploitation of the slaves by comparing the disparities in the conditions of the slaves and the
working poor of Britain (Barron 36).
Equiano uses both names in the title, Olaudah Equiano, the African name and Gustavus
Vassa, the European name. However, he offers higher significance to his assigned name, Vassa
to draw attention to the history of his Swedish namesake. When Equiano's intellectual journey
begins, he looks at himself to be more of European than an African. He relished being in the
company of English men, and soon he could understand and speak English correctly.
Religion and economics
Equiano's journey, when he was captured as a salve at the age of eleven goes on for the
next ten years. His journey from slavery to freedom occurs not just at physical but at an
intellectual and religious level as well. His views on class, religion, and economics are
sometimes complex and paradoxical (Dias 5). He was aware of the institution of slavery from a
very young age as he belongs to an upper class which was entitled to own slaves. However,
when he is taken as a slave, he compares the slavery in the West Indies to what he saw and
experience in his village as asserted by Dias (6). He seems to designate slavery into different
categories, and he weakens his views on antislavery later. Although he cites strong arguments
against slavery, he never condemns the slavery that went on in his childhood village.
Equiano relies on his literacy and trading ventures to assert his identity. He uses his
economic freedom to be more vocal about his views on slavery. However, several critics opine
that his commercial success was possible because of his economic transactions in the expanding
market economy within white society and thus dilutes his African identity (Shodhganga 100).
Equiano can be said to find his freedom and identity but only after moving through the world of
European and American whites. His diminishing references to the African self in the latter parts

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of the narrative reflect his increasing assimilation into white values (Shodhganga 101).
Moreover, as he embraces Christianity, he further gets co-opted into the white world and negates
his identity as a black.
Equiano ‘s identity can be seen as a hybrid as he has no completely shed his African
identity to take on the white Christian one. Even as a Christian, he honors his Igbo culture and
points to the similarities between Christianity and his Igbo culture.
He says, "A strong analogy... appears to prevail in the manners and customs of my
countrymen and those of the Jews before they reached the Land of Promise" (Equiano 25).
Thus, by detailing the immediacies of biblical Hebrew cultures and his Igbo culture, he
recasts the Bible stories in a contemporary African setting. Through the biblical text, he
pres4etns the outsider African culture closer to the readers (Shodhganga 105).
“I no longer looked upon them as spirits, but as men superior to us; and therefore I had
the stronger desire to resemble them, to imbibe their spirit, and imitate their manners” (Equiano
00).
Although Equiano argues against slavery, his cosmopolitan consciousness embraces a
kind of imperialism that led to his own enslavement. Thus, he sometimes develops the gaze of
the colonizer that raises questions about his true self and identity. His positionality shifts within
the transatlantic world in which he travels and lives. He is able to identify with his masters from
his young days, and his position is an enslaved and subjugated self (Barron 38). One can see
how he associates a personal and national identity with commerce and shows his adoption of
Britain’s imperialism values. The way he interacts with the Native Indians when he employs
trade is indicative of his identification with the colonizer.

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Nevertheless, despite developing the colonial mentality, he still identifies with the Native
Indians and slaves. He finds the Native Indians to be “more pious than those unenlightened
Indians” Still, he refers to his slaves as “his poor countrymen” whom he comforted with” care
and affection.” Thus, he contradicts himself when he fights against slavery and yet treats them as
weak who need others to comfort them. While he describes the abusive treatment meted out to
the slaves on his journeys, he becomes fond of the English culture. He takes pride that he can
speak and write the language well.
Conclusion
Equiano’s identity is a hybrid one, and it is evident from the title of his narrative where
he uses his African as well as European name. One can see different identities in Equiano as
African, African White, a Christian, slave, merchant, as one goes through the dynamics of
slavery and his personal journey. The hybrid construction of his identity is seen when he
appreciates his enslavement and identifies with his oppressor and converts to Christianity.
Equiano's self-portrayal reflects contradictions in racial consciousness, alienation, and
identification. There is a psychological dualism seen in his mindset. One can see his shifting
racial identity over his life course and his interactions. He uses education and religion to raise his
social and economic status. His views on class, religion, and economics develop based on his
personal journey as a slave. Equiano’s own journey from his childhood to slavery, education,
conversion, and freedom, reflects that he invented a hybrid identity rather than reclaim an
African identity.
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Works Cited
Barron, Agnel Natasha. " Representations of Labor in the Slave Narrative." Georgia State
University, vol. 1, no. 1, 2009, pp. 1-97.
Carrigan, Anthony. "Negotiating Personal Identity and Cultural Memory in Olaudah Equiano's
Interesting Narrative." Wasafiri, vol. 21, no. 2, 2006, pp. 42.
Dias, Carie. " Olaudah Equiano's Views of Slavery in his "Narrative of the Life." Bridgewater
State University, vol. 1, no. 1, 2004, pp. 5-10.
Equiano, Olaudah " The Interesting Narrative Of The Life Of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus
Vassa." Olaudah Equiano, vol. 1, no. 1, 1789, pp. 1- 360.
Karlberg, Hampus. "Textual Negotiations with Readers in Equiano's The Interesting Narrative."
Södertörns University, vol. 1, no. 1, 2015, pp. 1-28.
Shodhganga. " Enlightenment Rhetoric, Resistance and Self Creation in The Life ofOlaudah
Equiano." shodhganga, vol. 1, no. 1, 2018, pp. 73-108.