Orientalism (book)

''Orientalism'' ( 1978 ; 25th-anniversary edition 2003 ISBN 039474067x) is a 328-page study by Edward Said of a mostly British and French tradition, "cultural apparatus," or "style of thought" based on the Orient/Occident distinction. Orientalism has functioned as a "corporate institution for dealing with the Orient ," writes Said, and has played a role in Western political involvement in the Middle East . Said argues that the academic discipline of Middle Eastern studies, which long went by the name of "Orientalism," prepared the ground for and then helped sustain Western imperial hegemony over the Middle East through internalization and reproduction of prejudices and stereotypes blinding minds to the complexity of reality.

Said summarized his work in these terms: "My contention is that Orientalism is fundamentally a political doctrine willed over the Orient because the Orient was weaker than the West, which elided the Orient’s difference with its weakness. . . . As a cultural apparatus Orientalism is all aggression, activity, judgment, will-to-truth, and knowledge" (''Orientalism'', p. 204). Making a point that many have missed, Said wrote: "My whole point about this system is not that it is a misrepresentation of some Oriental essence -- in which I do not for a moment believe -- but that it operates as representations usually do, for a purpose, according to a tendency, in a specific historical, intellectual, and even economic setting" (p. 273).

Principally a study of 19th-century literary discourse strongly influenced by the work of figures like Noam Chomsky and Michel Foucault , Said's work also engages contemporary realities and has clear political implications as well. ''Orientalism'' is often classed with Postmodernist and Post-colonial works sharing various degrees of skepticism about Representation itself, but a few months before he died Said indicated he regarded the book as in the tradition of " Humanistic Critique " and the Enlightenment .

INFLUENCE

''Orientalism'' is certainly Edward Said's most influential work and has been translated into some 36 languages. It has been the focus of any number of controversies and polemics, notably with newspaper that through ''Orientalism'' "Said's critics agree with his admirers that he has singlehandedly effected a revolution in Middle Eastern studies in the U.S." He cited a critic who claimed since the publication of ''Orientalism'' "U.S. Middle Eastern Studies were taken over by Edward Said's post-colonial studies paradigm" ('' Daily Star '', October 20, 2003). Even those who contest its conclusions and criticize its scholarship, like George P. Landow of Brown University , call it "a major work." {Link without Title}

SYNOPSIS

Acknowledgments.

“ {Link without Title} ost of this book was written during 1975-1976” at Stanford. Ibrahim Abu-Lughod , Noam Chomsky , and Roger Owen “followed this project from its beginning to its conclusion” (xi).

Epigraphs

: “The East is a career” ( {Link without Title} ).

Preface to the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Edition {Link without Title}

Dated “New York, May 2003.” died on Sept. 24, 2003. Expresses discouragement at continued problems in being understood, but affirms “faith in the ongoing and literally unending process of emancipation and enlightenment that, in my opinion, frames and gives direction to the intellectual vocation” (xv). Now translated into 36 languages (xv). Not only personal experience, but the “almost-utopian” American university played a role in the book’s existence (xvi). Rejects view that Clash Of Civilizations is occurring, despite Iraq War (xvii-xviii). Understanding of Arabs and Islam has not improved (xviii). Orientalism playing a role among Neoconservative s (xix-xxi). Imperialism seems never to have ended (xxi-xxii). ''Orientalism'' intends “to use humanistic critique to open up the fields of struggle” (xxii). Said defends “ Humanism ” (xxiii). Responsibility and importance of the humanistic Intellectual , a tradition weakened by dilution of Education ; defense of Reason (xxiii-xxvii). Attacks Rumsfeld , Perle , and Cheney as well as Arab Anti-Americanism (xxvii-xxviii). Rejects Reductionism ; focus on individuals (xxviii-xxix). Praise for “the enormously encouraging democratic field of Cyberspace ” (xxix). “I would like to believe that ''Orientalism'' has had a place in the long and often interrupted road to human freedom” (xxx).

Introduction

I. A (“mainly, although not exclusively” {Link without Title} )French and British tradition. “The Orient is an integral part of European material civilization and culture. Orientalism expresses and represents that part culturally and even ideologically as a mode of , and “the almost total absence of any cultural position making it possible” to consider Arabs and Islam “dispassionately” (26-27). Orientalism a “secret sharer” of Western Anti-Semitism (27). Hopes to stimulate “a new kind of dealing with the Orient,” even the elimination of the “Orient” and the “Occident” altogether (28).

Chapter 1: The Scope of Orientalism

I. Knowing the Oriental

Analysis of knowledge and power in s, histories, traditions, societies, even Race s, and survive the consequences humanly?” i.e. is there “any way of avoiding the hostility expressed by the division”? (45). Kissinger as contemporary illustration (46-48). A 1972 essay by Harold W. Glidden on Arab mentality (48-49).

II. Imaginative Geography and Its Representations: ''Orientalizing the Oriental''

Application of Bachelardian “poetics of space” to representations of Islam up to 1700 (49-73). “ {Link without Title} t is finally Western ignorance which becomes more refined and complex, not some body of positive Western knowledge” (62). “Philosophically . . . Orientalism very generally is a form of radical Realism . . . Rhetorically speaking, Orientalism is absolutely anatomical and enumerative . .&nbnsp;. Psychologically, Orientalism is a form of Paranoia ” (72).

III. Projects

Operational successes of Orientalism (which demonstrate that “in general it was the West that moved upon the East, not vice versa” {Link without Title} ). Islam as “provocation” (74). Anquetil-Duperron , 1759 translation of the Avesta & 1786 translation of the '' Upanishads '' (76-77). William Jones goes to India, 1783 (77-79). Napoleon’s 1798 expedition (79-83). The ''Description de l’Égypte'' (23 vols., 1809-1823) (83-88). Ferdinand De Lesseps ; the Suez Canal as an expression of Orientalism (88-92).

IV. Crisis

The “textual attitude” (reliance on texts to guide real relations) (92-94). Oriental silence as a consequence of this attitude and of the West’s will to power over the Orient) (94-95). Imperial domination a “''preposterous'' transition” (96). Anwar Abdel Malek’s 1963 characterization of the Essentialism of relations to the Orient (97). Schlegel ’s racism (98-99). Disenchantment with the actual places when visited (100-01). Preconceptions, stereotypes (101-04). Crisis in Orientalism as political challenges emerge (104). Essentializing Islam to “ Tent and Tribe ” as a response (105). Satirical, polemical description of attitudes toward Orient (106-10).

Chapter 2: Orientalist Structures and Restructures

I: Redrawn Frontiers, Redefined Issues, Secularized Religion

Application of M.H. Abrams ’s ''Natural Supernaturalism'' to Orientalism: “the essential aspects of modern Orientalist theory and praxis . . . can be understood . . . as a set of structures inherited from the past, secularized, redisposed, and reformed by such disciplines as philology, which in turn were naturalized, modernized, and laicized substitutes for (or versions of) Christian supernaturalism” (122)

II: Silvestre de Sacy and Ernest Renan: ''Rational Anthropology and Philological Laboratory''

Silvestre De Sacy (1757-1838), first president of the Société Asiatique and producer of texts and a scholarly practice (123-30). Ernest Renan (1823-1892) is presented as “a type of cultural and intellectual praxis” and in very aggressive pages accused of racist aims for his ethnocentric philology (130-148).

III. Oriental Residence and Scholarship: The Requirements of Lexicography and Imagination''

Comparative treatments of the Orient that support , ''Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians''); gathering material for writing ( Burton , ''Pilgrimage to al-Madinah and Meccah''); some personal project ( Nerval , ''Voyage en Orient''). Lane (158-66).

IV. Pilgrims and Pilgrimages, British and French

The Oriental experience as unsettling, threatening (166-67). Reflections on pilgrimage (168-69). French pilgrims experience “a sense of acute loss” because of the absence of a French presence in the Orient (169-71). Chateaubriand (171-76). Lamartine ’s “imperialist Voyage” (176-79). Nerval and Flaubert (179-80). Nerval (181-84). Flaubert’s “eminently corporeal,” sexualized Orient (184-90). English writers have a less fantastic notion of the Orient because they “confront a set of imposing resistances” (192-93). Kinglake ’s ''Eothen'' (1844) (193-94). Burton wins high praise for actually learning something about the Orient, but is still full of “a sense of assertion and domination” (194-97).

Chapter 3: Orientalism Now

I. Latent and Manifest Orientalism

Pause to take stock; Westerners’ “sense of confrontation” in dealing with “the East” (201-04). “My contention is that Orientalism is fundamentally a political doctrine willed over the Orient because the Orient was weaker than the West, which elided the Orient’s difference with its weakness. . . . As a cultural apparatus Orientalism is all aggression, activity, judgment, will-to-truth, and knowledge” (204). Argues for the constancy of “an almost unconcious” ''latent'' Orientalism underlying the various changes in ''manifest'' Orientalism (206). Latent Orientalism is macho, takes the Orient’s weakness for granted (206-10). The administrators’ perspective: Cromer & Curzon (210-15). Geography becomes a key discipline (215-20). “Britain was in Egypt and Mesopotamia . . . France, on the other hand, seemed fated to hover over the Orient” (220). Orientalism “delivered” the Orient to the West in the early 20th century (221-23). The expert; British and French national differences (223-25).

II. Style, Expertise, Vision: ''Orientalism’s Worldliness''

Creation of the notion of the (237-43). Maurice Barrès (243-46). An instrumental attitude develops; Asia is regarded as a threat (246-54).

III. Modern Anglo-French Orientalism in Fullest Flower

Until World War I , the Orientalist was thought to be a generalist (255-57). Auerbach as illustration (258-61). Orientalism is intellectually backward (261). H.A.R. Gibb & Louis Massignon as representative types; their conceptions of Islam analyzed (263-84). Said, a postmodernist, is skeptical about representation itself: “the real issue is whether indeed there can be a true representation of anything” (272). “My whole point about this system is not that it is a misrepresentation of some Oriental essence — in which I do not for a moment believe — but that it operates as representations usually do, for a purpose, according to a tendency, in a specific historical, intellectual, and even economic setting” (273).

IV. The Latest Phase

Emergence of “the Arab Muslim” as “a figure in American Popular Culture ” in the post-WWII period (284). Popular images (285-87). Social science representations (288-93). U.S. Orientalism (293-300). The “Middle East studies establishment” (301-02). ''The Cambridge History of Islam'', summum of orthodox Orientalism (1970) (302-050. Twentieth-century persistence of the myth of Islam (306-12). P.J. Vatikiotis, ed., ''Revolution in the Middle East and Other Case Studies'' (1972). Anti- Bernard Lewis polemic (314-20). The use of Orientalism in policy jargon (321-24). What is the alternative to Orientalism? (325). “How does one ''represent'' other cultures? What is ''another'' culture?” (325). Orientalism a “failure”; call for work “promoting human community” instead (328).

Afterword {Link without Title}

I. ''Orientalism''’s gestation and then doubtful future (329). Translated into French, Arabic, Japanese, German, Portuguese, Italian, Polish, Spanish, Catalan, Turkish, Serbo-Croatian, and Swedish; Greek, Russian, Norwegian, and Chinese translations are underway (329-30). “''Orientalism'' now seems to me a collective book” (330). Said rejects the caricatures according to which the book is anti-Western or pro-Islamist; by being essentialist they miss the point entirely (330-34). The image of a mythic ''Orientalism'' doing battle with the powerful is popular (335-37). Said a critic of “a gloating and uncritical Nationalism ” (337-38). Problems with Arab reception of work (338-39). Charges of “‘residual’ Humanism ” (339-40). Bernard Lewis (341-45). II. The current situation (346). Huntington ’s “ Clash Of Civilizations ” is preposterous and is linked to U.S. policymakers (347-48). Post-modernism and Post-colonialism as two important “broad currents” deserving the attention of all (348-51).

EXTERNAL LINKS

Said's Splash , by Martin Kramer , on the book's impact on Middle Eastern studies.

Malcolm Kerr 's review of the book.

Orientalism.org , appraisals of the book.

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Orientalism (book)