Orientalism

Content Warning: The source text uses terms that are now considered outdated and offensive such as “the Orient,” “Orientalism,” and “oriental.” Said uses these terms to critique these concepts, and this study guide reproduces them in that critical context.

In Edward Said’s introduction to Orientalism, he begins by defining Orientalism as the intellectual and political dominance of Western countries (the Occident) over non-Western countries (the Orient). Throughout the book, he makes three crucial arguments about how this power differential emerged. Firstly, he argues that while Americans and Europeans have different notions of what constitutes the Orient, he is interested in the combined US and European intellectual and political investment in the Middle East and Asia. While US and European investments vary, Said proposes looking at Western patterns and attitudes toward the Middle East and Asia over time to better understand the impact of Orientalism. He argues that to gain a comprehensive history of Orientalist activity, one must view not only Western material interest in the Orient but also Western academic and literary imagination of the East.

Secondly, Said argues that the juxtaposition of the Occident against the Orient creates a “relationship of power […] of varying degrees of complex hegemony” (5). This power emerges not only through the domination of ideas but also through the production of policy and colonial administration. He gives the example of author Benjamin Disraeli’s novel, Tancred, in which the author describes the East as a “career” for Westerners. While Westerners are afforded economic mobility and access to the East, those who reside in the East are not granted the same ease.

Lastly, Said explains that his methodology for Orientalism is a comparative textual analysis of the “style, figures of speech, setting, narrative devices, historical and social circumstances” of works by Western scholars, governmental administrators, and writers about the East (21). He notes that while common sentiments mark a “distinction between pure and political knowledge” (9), he hopes that a comparative textual analysis will show how intellectual and political activity are intertwined projects for Western interests in the East. His methodology centers on the idea that a close study of cultural production matters despite a long literary tradition of evading political analysis in cultural work. The goal of his work is to erode the binary of the Orient and the Occident entirely and create a new way of understanding global cultures, politics, and relations.

Said also clarifies that while the scope of Orientalism’s impact on non-Western countries is broad, his focus will be on Western interests in Islam in the Middle East with less emphasis on Asia. He shares that this emphasis has to do with his investment in the subject of Orientalism as he is “Oriental” himself as a Palestinian who grew up in Egypt.