Orientalism

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Summary: I can see why people are buying this BUT....
Review: I can see why people are buying this now, following Said's sad and premature death, but the extreme way in which he used to put things (I remember he almost converted an audience I was in to support Israel by the time he had finished) is sad proof that he did not do the Palestinian cause in which he believed any good. (And I speak as one with many Palestinian friends and who is very much in favour of the pro-peace Palestinian cause). Saying that Jane Austen in Mansfield Park is an orientalist is complete rubbish! So read this book, but do so with your mind open. Christopher Catherwood, author of CHRISTIANS, MUSLIMS AND ISLAMIC RAGE (Zondervan, 2003)

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Summary: A new paradigm for Middle Eastern Studies?
Review: Orientalism has undoubtedly provided Middle Eastern Studies with a new paradigm-as Edward Said had intended. The book begins innocuously, giving little indication of the stridency and moralizing to come. Said proposed that Orientalism he was about to "sketch" was simply "a style of thought based upon an ontological and epistomilogical distinction between the Orient and the Occident" (p. 2). He then brought attention to his fears that "distortion and inaccuracy" might thwart his account but consoled himself by the thought of the additional volumes that might be written by "scholars and critics" (p.24). And indeed this book launched a study of Orientalism Said at first defined as "principal methodological devices for studying authority here are what can be called strategic location, which is a way of describing the author's text in relation to the Oriental material he writes about; and strategic formation, which is a way of analyzing the relationship between texts and the way in which groups of texts... acquire mass, density, and referential power among themselves... I use the notion of strategy simply to identify the problem every writer on the Orient has faced ... Everyone who writes about the Orient must locate himself vis a vis the Orient." (p.20)

This then was "Orientalism" and it defines the limits of Middle Eastern studies to the present day. Yet it is more than a new method for addressing old problems. It created a whole new set of questions for Middle Eastern Studies and vigorously excluded others. By strategic formation, Said referred to a way of viewing any text, artifact, or allusion, or even imaginative allusion (see his discussion on Jane Austen for example) to the Orient. These were a priori objects contaminated by Orientalism. Said thus has no interest in "proving" Orientalism; he simply assumed it.

But again and again we get back to the question of what exactly is "Orientalism" for Said defined it in two mutually excluding ways. On the one hand, he describes the object of his inquiries as "an almost unconscious (and certainly untouchable) positivity", a kind of opaque object that gave his study focus. And for this reason, one couldn't simply reduce the subject to a "western imperialist plot... a structure of lies or of myths which were the truth be told, would simply blow away" (p. 6). And yet, on the other hand he trivializes the very claims he made by declaring that every European in saying anything about the Orient was "racist, an imperialist and almost totally ethnocentric" (p.204). This is then a kind of "Just Say 'No' to Orientalism" message---and yet, if this is the case why not simply declare the whole field off limits? Why enunciate such a detailed paradigm for Middle Eastern studies?

What is "Orientalism"?

Said never provides us with an answer. Yet it is the new paradigm for Middle Eastern studies in our universities.

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Summary: Brilliant and courageous outlook
Review: Edward W. Said is arguably the most important intellectual alive. The Themes he dwells upon are fundamental to understanding today's world. In this book, Said brings a refreshing insight into European literature and its prejudices.
A Must read.

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Summary: Book provokes important debate
Review: In Orientalism, Edward Said had sought to apply the Foucaultian concept of discourse to argue that the study of "the Orient" developed in ways which served the ends of Western imperialism, and that the discipline is an integral part of the mechanism of Western domination over the Middle East. While his conclusions are controversial, the book stimulates an interesting debate and shows the state of much of the field of Middle Eastern studies circa 1980.

Said's main limitation in writing the book is that he doesn't speak German, the language in which many of the most influential works of Orientalism (Ignac Goldziher's Muslim Studies and Joseph Schacht's Introduction to Mohammaden Jurisprudence, for example) were written. In addition, he doesn't compare the study of the Orient to the study of other regions in the same period. Hence, when he complains near the end that much "modern Orientalism" reduces people to statistics, he doesn't mention that the same could be true of the study of American history at that time.

The work holds up well for highlighting specific problems in the field, such as the portrayal of the East as deficient in some manner. One cannot agree, however, that it continues in scholarly circles to the present, when most "orientalists" in fact tend to be ardently pro-Arab politically. This was true to a certain degree even earlier in the century when Louis Massignon and T.E. Lawrence both became active in pro-Arab causes.

Said highlights important trends in the field of Middle Eastern studies and places them in a provocative framework. Readers can judge for themselves whether that framework holds up under scrutiny.

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Summary: Arguably flawed but exceptionally potent and important
Review: Public opinion has gone in and out like the tides on Said's book since I first read it some six odd years ago. It has been said that the primal characteristic of a truly enlightened mind is its ability to entertain two seemingly contradictory ideas at the same time; in that context I find it odd that people can be so proud of their total discrediting of Said's work in favor of the preeminent and (seemingly) diametrically opposed Bernard Lewis. It is obvious to me that both men have something provocative to teach us about Europe and America's relationship with the Middle East (as it has been over the centuries and is reflected in culture and scholarship), and both need to be heard in that context.

It is not often that a brilliantly, exhaustively researched book on an alternatingly controversial and trivialized subject can engender an emotional response of the magnitude with which this work does--which usually means that it is worth reading. In documenting the psychological architecture of the western mind and its perspective on the East--or the "Orient"--he deconstructs it. The idea that it exists deconstructs it by nature; before reading this book you will swear that most of what we know of the Arabian East is the absolute truth, without even being aware that it's been either romanticized into impotence or isn't much of anything complimentary, let alone influential.

I rate ORIENTALISM, for its effect on our psyche as Americans alone (regardless of race or assumed political leanings), as one of the most important books written in the last decades of the 20th century. The world looks the way it does not because of natural law, like the reasons why the Sahara has become a desert--or at least not by the natural laws we have imagined. Edward Said, regardless of the possibility of biases coming through his scholarship, regardless of the political realities he left out of his thesis, shows this in remarkable fashion to people--like myself--who never considered this fact's existence (let alone its influence on my perceptions of the Middle East in all their forms).

Be mature enough to accept that it is not the only educated opinion or set of facts about our complex world, and this book will be a great read and teach a great deal. I would suggest triangulating ORIENTALISM with Karen Armstrong's HOLY WAR and Moseddeq Ahmed's WAR ON FREEDOM, for a truly eye-opening experience of the Western psyche regarding the East.

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Summary: Old and New Knowledges
Review: Said is convinced after reading virtually all of the existent orientalist literature that something smells rotten in the orientalist libraries of the world. It is his conjecture that orientalists all belong to the same club, read the same books, and so not surprisingly they all come to the same conclusions.
This is an intriguing conjecture and one cannot help suspecting that this is at least in part very possibly true. However Said does not spend a lot of time with each book and/or author he analyzes and as a result his analysis seem superficial. Often Said extracts but one quote from an entire multi-volume study and on the basis of that one quote makes spectacular claims about authorial limitations and biases. He does this over and over again. Thats not to say that the orientalists are completely innocent of the charges Said brings up against them just that this scholarly trial is not a fair one. An exhaustive study of any one of the orientalist scholars would certainly show each man to have strengths and weaknesses, but Said doesn't present a balanced study of each mans work(and there are a lot of very distinct personalities in the orientalist library), he dismantles them one by one on the basis of their weaknesses. So while Said may be correct in not taking orientalist scholarship at its word I think he is incorrect in taking his argument to such an extreme as to indicate everything in the orientalist library is at best tainted and at worst utterly fraudelent. Said goes too far and as a result while reading (Saids)Orientalism I lost faith in Said to give an accurate assessment of the topic. I came away from the book feeling that there was more in the orientalist library than in Saids slender philosophy. What is most interesting to me is that I've yet to encounter any book which offers a view of the orient which would seriously contradict the one put forth by the famous orientalists. Said and the postcolonial group write a lot of books examining the influence empire had on literary output. All these books criticize orientalist authors but none offer any alternative way to see the east. In other words if you read a modern account of the east by a travel writer like William Dalrymple you are likely to find his observations not to be all that dissimilar to observations made by a nineteenth century travel writer. I think it quite possible that the postcolonial theorists(and Said is their most outspoken member)are a new kind of club and this club has its own rules and reads the same books and come to the same conclusions. Said quotes Vico in his study and says that all knowledge is man made. The orientalists made one kind of knowledge and the postcolonial theorist have registered their complaint about the orientalist kind of knowledge but the theorists have yet to make any headway in creating a new kind of knowledge which they would deem more accurate.

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Summary: Orientalism Revisited
Review: Compounded by debauched images like the one on the cover page of Orientalism, the collective Western sub-conscious in regards to Arab-Islamic culture has been undeniably clouded by a style of thought that harbors superiority. One need look no further than our most esteemed news sources. For this, according to Said, we have Orientalism to blame.
It is the contemporary backlash of Orientalist stereotypes turned prejudices that so disturb author Edward Said. In his view, the resulting legacy of fear and estrangement that characterize the socio-political status quo between the West and Arab nations (and Islam as an ethos) cannot be understated. The irony is that despite the fact that information is more accessible than ever, Oriental biases are being perpetuated more than ever, with shameless stereotypes of Islam being used as fodder on film and even mainstream news-media. This is exemplified by our modern coverage of foreign policy in the Middle East throughout the past century. Diplomatic hypocrisies are whitewashed by the media machine with latent, age-old stereotypes that surface when strategic interests are at risk. Following years of partnership (amidst ethnic-cleansing), the US media ?at the behest of the government ?suddenly saturated the public with the caricature of Iraq's Saddam Hussein as the crazed Arab. Though true, this was marketed at convenience (nevermind Halabja), with the inevitable cultural watershed going unquestioned in the long-term, reducing normal Arabs to "rag-heads?of the little value in the mainstream mind. Similarly in Iran, the US government's coup of the first-ever democratically elected government set the table for Khomeini's stringent Islamic regime years later. Anti-American images and rhetoric dominated our media while opposing motivations were never examined. Overnight, Iranians went from being civilized partners to a sworn enemy. As our media/ government would have us believe, it was only a matter of time before the "other?side lapsed into it's degenerate nature. Though rarely put so bluntly, this is what it is.
Because Orientalism is rooted in canonical history, literature, and art, its treatment is necessarily as exhaustive as the subject is vast. To more effectively address this breadth, Said makes three major claims in Orientalism upon which he builds his case against: that though purporting to be objective, Orientalism served political ends; that Orientalism helped define Europe's self-image; and finally, that Orientalism has produced a distorted and thus false description of Arabs and Islamic culture. In reading the text, one cannot help but appreciate the acute machinations of the author's mind at work, wielding insight that is both incisive and original. Often times, however, the language employed can be painfully esoteric, to the point that one is naturally inclined to grow weary, if not skeptical, of the substance behind the style. It is fair to say that if one read this book casually (though hard to imagine) without a critical mindset, the sheer pretension of the text might compel the reader to accept Said's theories wholesale. And yet while Said's conclusions and scope are revolutionary in themselves, and much of his argument plainly convincing, the case for Orientalism is not without flaws.
Although Said divides his argument three ways, the task of encompassing such a broad concept in a small volume is daunting. Many pieces of knowledge elemental to the development of his arguments are presupposed along the way i.e. historical figures, events, dates implying political context etc., etc. Though the book is supposed to be confined to the colonial era, Said strays as far as Greek history to explain antecedents of Orientalist philosophy, all the while dropping names like Flaubert and Dante as though they were next-door-neighbors. If one is not an exceptionally diversified historian, this makes for a rather fragmented understanding of the case. The need to investigate references on the side is almost certain, at the expense of Said's momentum.
Looking at the heart of his case, Said's assumptions of causality are largely insufficient. Early on he contends that "colonial rule was justified by Orientalism? a statement that is postured as fact though he fails to adequately support it with coherent evidence. A stronger case could be made for trade and military causes as being the main catalyst of the West's (primarily France & England) imperial agenda in the Middle East. Michel Foucault's theorem that knowledge always generates power is treated at length to bolster this claim. Nonetheless, ultimately one can only conclude that Orientalism gave the West a better grasp of Oriental culture accompanied by an unspoken sentiment of eminence, as colonial motivations and objectives are left unexplained. This pre-empts the question as to whether culture and politics are moderately interrelated, or one and the same. Said makes mention of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness in a hollow attempt at illustration, arguing that "reading (the book) was a part of the European effort to hold on to, think about, plan for Africa? In effect he makes a presumption that can in no way be upheld or refuted by historical evidence and is thus weightless. Liberal assertions of this quality appear intermittently as the book progresses, at once logical and confounding to a student of history used to endorsing hard evidence rather than a good reputation.
Indeed Said may have very well bit of more than he could chew. But to his credit, he made a bold case for himself in an area that most scholars would dare not approach. Methodological shortcomings aside ?specifically his assumptions of causality in history - Said's arguments in Orientalism spawned an intense intellectual debate spanning many fields of scholarship that has yet to lose any steam. He makes it clear that as humans we are apt to project, but must first attempt to search ourselves according to our varying identities. More importantly, Said articulates the plight of many disenfranchised people in a manner that demands attention and respect. So while the flesh of his case against Orientalism may be spoilt in some respects, the bones are in tact.

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Summary: Is there an Orient on Earth ?
Review: This book is verbose and repetitive.The only idea, endlessly repeated, is that "Orientalists" have taken their fantasm about Middle East people and cultures for realities. All unnumerable people who have travelled, made business or have had love affairs in these countries, have studied their literature or have tried to administer them, have been totally wrong. Saïd repeats again and again that they have stuck to a false vision of "Orient", coined once for all by writers as Chateaubriand, Renan or Flaubert. In this vision, Orient is characterized by despotism,fatalism and sensuality. Of course, Saïd never says that Oriental countries are profoundly democratic, that their people are enthusiastic innovators and that young men feel a total indifference about sex. But the naïve reader may jump to such conclusions.
Against those who deplore the present state of Middle East economies and of the oriental intellectual life, Saïd opposes the so frequent reference to such up-to-date personalities as Avicenna, Averroès and Haroun-al-Rachid.

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Summary: Ground-breaking scholarship
Review: Edward Said's ground-breaking work can be critized on many levels. Some say his writing does not allow adequate agency for Arab and Asian people. In some cases, his examples of historic authors who are allegedly discrediting the "Orient," actually seem to be worshipping. Of course, Edward Said would say that both demonizing and deifying are problematic because both are distortions and Said wanted to decrease distortion. Nonetheless, some so-called Orientalist authors that he sites seem to be unfairly critised.
The weaknesses in Said's work do not detract from it's overall value. It is a new way to examine racism -- not from a purely emotional or coldly statistical perspective, but from human and academic perspectives. While the difference between emotional and human is slight, it is critical. This book is a close examination of how racism in many forms, Arab, Asian or "Other," permeates the institutions of the world. Dangerously, these "authoritative" views of Other people become acceptable ways of talking about each other. In this way, racism becomes embedded in the educational systems, in the universities, in the libraries of the world. Elimating it becomes all the more difficult, because it creates the illusion that it is natural, authentic, scientific and rational.
Like Freud, Said's theories can be fragmented and individually discredited. But also like Freud, Said has given the world a whole new framework from which to think about preconceived notions that were not previously questioned within the academic realm.
Said's Orientalism is an excellent work that I strongly recommend to anyone trying to understand the world, especially the Middle East. Breaking out of the International media paradigms is difficult without some assistance. Said provides the necessary assistance.

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Summary: Great expose
Review: I read this book knowing very little about Orientalism as an academic field. I thought the book was very much needed to expose the views the West has held and does hold about the Middle East. I really recommend this book for people who like hot topics and controversy.