Readings
Edward W. Said, Orientalism
Orientalism: A way of coming to terms with the Orient that is based on the
Orient’s special place in European Western experience
The Orient is a place of Europe’s greatest and richest and oldest colonies, the
source of its civilizations and languages, its cultural contestant
The Orient is an integral part of European material civilization and culture
Orientalism determines what can be said about the Orient
It is also part of material civilization and culture
A mode of discourse with supporting institutions, vocabulary, scholarship,
imagery, doctrines, even colonal bureaucracies and colonial styles
Defining Orientalism:
1. Orientalism is an academic field/study
Anyone who teaches, writes about or researches the Orient is an Orientalist and
what he or she does is Orientalism
Area studies, a discipline
2. Orientalism generally
A style of thought
It is based upon an ontological and epistemological distinction between the
Orient (East) and the Occident (West)
3. Orientalism as a discourse
Dealing with the Orient by making statements about it, authorizing views of it,
describing it, teaching it, settling it, ruling over it
The Western style for dominating, restructuring and having authority over the
Orient
Readings 1
, Michel Foucault’s notion of discourse to understand the systematic discipline by
which European culture was able to manage the Orient during the post-
Enlightenment period
It can be discussed and analyzed as the corporate institution for dealing with the
Orient
The text is part of a structuralist approach:
Orientalism is not a free subject or action
European culture gained in strength and identity by setting itself off against the
Orient as a sort of surrogate and even underground self
Supporting qualifications of Orientalism:
1. There is a reality of the Orient, but Orientalism concerns itself with the
internal consistency of ideas about the Origin
Regular constellation of ideas as the pre-eminent thing about the Orient and not
to its mere being
2. The relationship between the Occident and the Orient is a relationship of
power and hegemony
Ideas, cultures and histories have to be studied together with their force, their
configurations of power
Strength is relative between East and West
The Orient was Orientalised because it could be made Oriental
Certain cultural forms predominate over others - the form of this cultural
leadership by implied consent is hegemony
Orientalism depends on positional superiority - discursive form of power, via
social norms
3. The structure of Orientalism is more than a structure of lies and of myths,
it is a system of knowledge about the Orient
‘The sheer knitted-together strength of Orientalist discourse’
Orientalism is more valuable as a sign of European-Atlanic power over the
Orient than it is as a verdict discourse about the Orient
After WWII:
Franco-British involvement in the Orient replaced by American domination
Readings 2
Edward W. Said, Orientalism
Orientalism: A way of coming to terms with the Orient that is based on the
Orient’s special place in European Western experience
The Orient is a place of Europe’s greatest and richest and oldest colonies, the
source of its civilizations and languages, its cultural contestant
The Orient is an integral part of European material civilization and culture
Orientalism determines what can be said about the Orient
It is also part of material civilization and culture
A mode of discourse with supporting institutions, vocabulary, scholarship,
imagery, doctrines, even colonal bureaucracies and colonial styles
Defining Orientalism:
1. Orientalism is an academic field/study
Anyone who teaches, writes about or researches the Orient is an Orientalist and
what he or she does is Orientalism
Area studies, a discipline
2. Orientalism generally
A style of thought
It is based upon an ontological and epistemological distinction between the
Orient (East) and the Occident (West)
3. Orientalism as a discourse
Dealing with the Orient by making statements about it, authorizing views of it,
describing it, teaching it, settling it, ruling over it
The Western style for dominating, restructuring and having authority over the
Orient
Readings 1
, Michel Foucault’s notion of discourse to understand the systematic discipline by
which European culture was able to manage the Orient during the post-
Enlightenment period
It can be discussed and analyzed as the corporate institution for dealing with the
Orient
The text is part of a structuralist approach:
Orientalism is not a free subject or action
European culture gained in strength and identity by setting itself off against the
Orient as a sort of surrogate and even underground self
Supporting qualifications of Orientalism:
1. There is a reality of the Orient, but Orientalism concerns itself with the
internal consistency of ideas about the Origin
Regular constellation of ideas as the pre-eminent thing about the Orient and not
to its mere being
2. The relationship between the Occident and the Orient is a relationship of
power and hegemony
Ideas, cultures and histories have to be studied together with their force, their
configurations of power
Strength is relative between East and West
The Orient was Orientalised because it could be made Oriental
Certain cultural forms predominate over others - the form of this cultural
leadership by implied consent is hegemony
Orientalism depends on positional superiority - discursive form of power, via
social norms
3. The structure of Orientalism is more than a structure of lies and of myths,
it is a system of knowledge about the Orient
‘The sheer knitted-together strength of Orientalist discourse’
Orientalism is more valuable as a sign of European-Atlanic power over the
Orient than it is as a verdict discourse about the Orient
After WWII:
Franco-British involvement in the Orient replaced by American domination
Readings 2
