Said`s Orientalism

Edward Said

Orientalism

Power and Knowledge

The analysis of Orientalism , published in 1978 , has become a classic in the study of the West 's relationship with its others . The depiction of Orientalism , in all its many manifestations , as a 'discourse ' has raised a storm of theoretical and methodological argument , but it has given an unparalleled focus and political clarity to the complex range of activities by which Europe gained knowledge of its oriental other (Klein ,

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In Culture and Imperialism (1993 , HYPERLINK "http /en .wikipedia .org /wiki /Palestinian " \o "Palestinian

" Palestinian - HYPERLINK "http /en .wikipedia .org /wiki /United_States " \o "United States " American HYPERLINK "http /en .wikipedia .org /wiki /Literary_theory " \o "Literary theory literary theorist Edward Wadie Said proposed some alternatives to Orientalism . He suggested that producers of knowledge could extricate themselves from Orientalist discourse , and the power relations it constructs , by acknowledging the inextricable interdependence ' of East and West , by recognizing the inescapably hybrid ' nature of all forms of culture , and by developing the ability to think sympathetically ' about others ' rather than just about us Only by becoming aware of the progressive integration ' of East and West that imperialism set in motion , Said argued , can the imperialist logic of difference be undermined (Klein ,

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Said has this process of discipline , administration , and incarceration in mind when he construes Orientalism as a discourse of power knowledge , and redemption . Orientalism cannot be understood without the category discourse , without the systematic discipline that it presupposed , and the distinctive relation between the exercise of power and the production of forms of knowledge (power /knowledge ) that it represents

Edward Said argues that the public intellectual must function within institutions , in part , as an exile , as someone whose "place it is publicly to raise tough and challenging questions . In the relationship between knowledge and power , the intellectual must stand as someone who cannot easily be co-opted by governments or corporations " Once again Said is relevant in calling for intellectuals to recognize the importance of "asking questions , making distinctions , restoring to memory all those things that tend to be overlooked or walked past in the rush to collective judgment and action

He advocates a skeptical , if ambivalent attitude that in the interest of human freedom and knowledge , a quasi-anarchic attitude toward cultural authority . Said 's idea of culture is qualified by his unwillingness to wholly embrace the contrarian views (Hart , p26

According to Said , knowledge of its oriental other is a perfect demonstration of the power of 'amateurism ' in intellectual work . When this 'something ' is a whole region of the world , in which dozens of ethnicities , nationalities and languages are gathered under the spurious category 'the Orient , then the link between that knowledge and the power it confirms becomes profoundly important (Ashcroft ,

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To reiterate , Orientalism combines several disciplines : a collection of academic disciplines , anontology , epistemology , and a discourse (Said was greatly influenced by the works of Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault and from earlier critics of western Orientalism such as A . L...