Michał Moch
Graduate School For Social Studies
Concepts of orientalism and occidentalism in contemporary social
sciences – new meanings of traditional terms
Today we observe intriguing changes in the sphere of mass consciousness. Old terms
and notions acquire new meanings that differ a lot from former understandings. Building of
the world through usage of terms that were created for purposes of Western civilization – this
intellectual process is researched and criticized in works of many luminous scholars. It is also
the case of such words and important notions as ‘orientalism’ and opposite to latter
‘occidentalism’. Contemporary discussion concerning the very term of ‘orientalism’ has
begun with the publication of the crucial dissertation Orientalism by Edward R. Said (1978),
American with Palestinian background, theorist of literature and famous essayist. In my essay
I’m going to recapitulate briefly the discussion caused by mentioned text and to think how it
influenced on contemporary social sciences. A very important and basic thing is to define old
and new, traditional and modern, meanings of ‘orientalism’ and ‘occidentalism’.
1. Short history of ‘orientalism’
I could begin my discussion of the terms with the simple encyclopaedic definition of
‘orientalism’. It is the study of Near and Far Eastern societies and cultures, languages and
peoples by Western scholars. It can also refer to the imitation or aspects of Eastern cultures in
the West by writers, designers and artists1. Like the term Orient itself Orientalism derives
from a Latin word Oriens referring simply to the rising of the sun, to imply ‘the East’ in a
relative sense. This is the opposite of the term Occident, which has largely dropped from
common usage in its traditional sense. We could also mention similar terms: French-derived
Levant and Anatolia, from the Greek anatole, two further locutions for the direction in which
the sun rises2. In terms of the Old World, Europe was considered to be ‘The West’ or
‘Occidental’ and the furthest known Eastern extremity was called ‘the East’ or ‘the Orient’.
Since at least the Roman Empire until at least the Middle Ages; what is now considered to be
‘the Middle East’ was then considered ‘the Orient’. During that period, the flourishing
cultures of the Far East (on territories of modern China, Vietnam and so on) were unknown in
1
Compare: entry Orientalism in: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia [Internet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism, May 2006].
2
Ibidem.
2
Europe, just as the Old Continent was essentially unknown in the Far East. For example, the
Chinese name for China translates to ‘The Middle Kingdom’.
The encyclopaedic definition of understanding and contexts of ‘the Orient’ is worthy
of citing:
“Over the time, the common understanding of ‘the Orient’ has continually shifted East
as Western explorers travelled deeper into Asia. In Biblical times, the Three Wise Men
'from The Orient' were actually Magi from "The East" (relative to Palestine), now
understood to be from 'The Persian Empire' also known by the Greeks as Media. Since
then, as Europe gained expanding knowledge of the seemingly endless "Eastern
Frontier", the definition of 'The Orient' progressively shifted Eastwards, until the
Pacific Ocean was reached, in what is now also known as 'The Far East'. This can
cause some confusion about the historical and geographic scope of Oriental studies.
However, there still remain some contexts where 'The Orient' or 'Oriental' refer
to older definitions. For example, 'Oriental Spices' typically come from regions
extending from the Middle East through the Indian sub-continent to Indo-China3. Also,
travel on the Orient Express (from Paris to Istanbul), is East bound (towards the sun
rise); but does not reach what is currently understood to be The Orient. In France, the
terms "Orient" and "Orientals" can also still be understood to refer primarily to the
Middle East and North Africa. In contemporary English, Oriental is usually a
synonym for the culture and goods from the parts of East Asia traditionally occupied
by East Asians and Southeast Asians, excluding Indians, Arabians and other more
westerly peoples.
It is difficult to be precise about the origin of the distinction between the
"West" and the "East". However the rise of both Christianity and Islam produced a
sharp opposition between European Christendom and the Muslim cultures to the East
and in North Africa. During the Middle Ages Islamic peoples were demonised as
"alien" enemies of the Christian world. European knowledge of cultures further to the
East was very sketchy indeed. Nevertheless, there was a vague awareness that
complex civilizations existed in India and China, from which luxury goods such as
3
Ibidem.
3
woven textiles and ceramics were imported. As European explorations and
colonisations expanded a distinction emerged between non-literate peoples, for
example in Africa and the Americas, and the literate cultures of the East”4
In the 18th century Enlightenment thinkers sometimes characterized aspects of Eastern
cultures as superior to the Christian West. For example Voltaire promoted research into
Zoroastrianism in the belief that it would support a rational Deism superior to Christianity.
Others praised the religious tolerance of Islamic countries in contrast with the Christian West,
or the status of scholarship in Mandarin China. With the translation of the Avesta by Abraham
Anquetil-Duperron and the discovery of the Indo-European languages by William Jones
complex connections between the early history of Eastern and Western cultures emerged.
However, these developments occurred in the context of rivalry between France and Britain
for control of India, and were associated with attempts to understand colonised cultures in
order more effectively to control them. Liberal economists such as James Mill dismissed
Eastern countries on the grounds that their civilizations were static and corrupt. Even Karl
Marx characterised the “Asiatic mode of production” as unchanging.. Some aspects of Islamic
tradition as synonym of backwardness and statism were sharply criticized by Ernest Renan.
Despite this, the first serious European studies of Buddhism and Hinduism were
undertaken by scholars such as Eugene Burnouf and Max Müller. Serious study of Islam also
emerged through Edward William Lane and other scholars. By the mid-19th century "Oriental
studies" was becoming an established academic discipline, represented in respected European
universities such as Tubingen, Leiden and so on . However, while scholarly study expanded,
so did racist attitudes and popular stereotypes of “wily” orientals. Often scholarly ideas were
mixed with such prejudicial racial or religious assumptions. Eastern art and literature were
still seen as "exotic" and as inferior to Classical Graeco-Roman ideals. Their political and
economic systems were generally thought to be feudal “oriental despotisms” (comaparable to
ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia) and their alleged cultural inertia was considered to be
resistant to progress. Many critical theorists regard this form of Orientalism as part of a larger,
ideological colonialism justified by the concept of the “white man's burden”. Edward Said’s
critic was rooted in this negative conception of Orientalism.
Ibidem. Polish definitions of ‘orientalism’, contained in main dictionaries, don’t mention Said’s pejorative
reformulation of the term.
4
4
Oriental elements can be easily found in Medieval, Renaissaince and Baroque art, but
in the 19th century became an established and very important element. Myth of the Orient as
exotic, corrupted, feudal and also full of erotic sensuality was articulated in works of such big
artists as Eugene Delacroix, Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres and Henri Matisse5. Some
artists viewed Orient as a mirror for ‘the West’ and the Western culture itself eg Gustave
Flaubert’s novel Sallambo with the methaphorical portrait of Carthage in Northern Africa.
Romantic literature (eg. Johan Goethe, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Samuel Taylor Coleridge,
Adam Mickiewicz) treated oriental motives as an important source of inspiration, but still it
was the vision of oriental (especially Islamic) culture created by Europeans with their cult of
sensuality and secret atmosphere. Summing up, we could say that specifically understood
oriental elements played a very important role in European arts, especially in literature,
paintings and architecture.
Despite this often mixed tradition, the word "Orientalism" carried no negative
connotations after the Second World War. Respected institutions like the Oriental Institute of
Chicago or the London School of Oriental and African Studies carried the term without
reproach. "Oriental" was simply understood as the opposite of "occidental" ('western') and
‘orientalists’ (such as Albert Hourani, Maxime Rodinson, Bernard Lewis, in Poland Józef
Bielawski, Ananiasz Zajączkowski and so on) were viewed only as scholars, experts in
history, culture and religions of Middle East, Indian subcontinent or Far East. Situation
changed with the publication of Edward Said’s book.
2. Edward Said’s vision of orientalism
The word ‘Orientalism’ began to develope negative connotations following the
publication of the crucial work Orientalism by the U.S. based Palestinian scholar Edward R.
Said6. Said’s book is based on describing and critiquing "Orientalism," which he perceived as
One of such „oriental” paintings, Snake charmer by Jean-Leon Gerome was revealed as an illustration on the
title page of Edward Said’s Orientalism. This stereotypical depiction of Islamic culture with a beatiful young boy
dancing among Bedouins illustates very well conceptions of the author.
6
Edward Wadie Said (November 1, 1935 – September 24, 2003) was a well-known Palestinian-American
literary theorist, critic and outspoken pro-Palestinian activist. Said was born in Jerusalem (then in the British
Mandate of Palestine). He joined the faculty of Columbia University in 1963 and served as a professor of
English and Comparative Literature for several decades. Said became the Parr Professor of English and
Comparative Literature at Columbia, in 1977, and subsequently became the Old Dominion Foundation Professor
in the Humanities. In 1992, Said attained the rank of University Professor, which is Columbia's most prestigious
academic position. He also taught at Harvard, John Hopkins, and Yale universities. As a Palestinian activist, Said
campaigned first for a creation of an independent Palestinian state, and then later for a single Jewish-Arab state.
From 1977 until 1991, Said was an independent member of the Palestinian National Council who tended to stay
5
5
a constellation of false assumptions underlying Western attitudes toward the East. Said
described the process which could be called subtle and persistent Eurocentric prejudice
against Arabo-Islamic peoples and their culture7. He argued that a long tradition of false and
romanticized images of Asia and the Middle East in Western culture had served as an implicit
justification for Europe and America's colonial and imperial ambitions. Just as fiercely, he
denounced the practice of Arab elites who internalized the American and British orientalists'
ideas of Arabic culture using colonial practices to justify dictator character of governments. It
is important to mention that Said’s book is concentrated very much on the Arab Middle East
and doesn’t give any material or remarks on the region of Far East. So, in terms of border his
‘orientalism’ is limited geographically as it was practicized during the Middle Ages.
The work begins with two important mottos: They cannot represent themselves; they
must be represented (by Karl Marx) and The East is a career (by Benjamin Disraeli)8. Then,
Said puts forward several definitions of Orientalism in the introduction to Orientalism. Some
of these have been more widely quoted and influential than others:
“Unlike the Americans, the French and British – less so the Germans, Russians,
Spanish, Portuguese, Italians, and Swiss – have had a long tradition of what I shall be
calling 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 not only
adjacent to Europe; it is also the place of Europe's greatest and richest and oldest
colonies, the source of its civilizations and languages, its cultural contestant, and one
of its deepest and most recurring images of the Other. In addition, the Orient has
helped to define Europe (or the West) as its contrasting image, idea, personality,
experience. Yet none of this Orient is merely imaginative. The Orient is an integral
part of European material civilization and culture. Orientalism expresses and
represents that part culturally and even ideologically as a a mode of discourse with
out of factional struggles, the author of important works as Orientalism (1978), Culture and Imperialism (1993),
Reflections on Exile (2001).
7
Compare: entry Edward Said in: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia [Internet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism, May 2006].
8
Edward W. Said, Orientalism. Western Conceptions of the Orient, Penguin Books, London 1991, page XIV.
6
supporting institutions, vocabulary, scholarship, imagery, doctrines, even colonial
bureaucracies and colonial styles (...)
It will be clear to the reader...that by Orientalism I mean several things, all of them, in
my opinion, interdependent. The most readily accepted designation for Orientalism is
an academic one, and indeed the label still serves in a number of academic institutions.
Anyone who teaches, writes about, or researches the Orient – and this applies whether
the person is an anthropologist, sociologist, historian, or philologist – either in its
specific or its general aspects, is an Orientalist, and what he or she says or does is
Orientalism (...)
Related to this academic tradition, whose fortunes, transmigrations, specializations,
and transmissions are in part the subject of this study, is a more general meaning for
Orientalism. Orientalism is a style of thought based upon ontological and
epistemological distinction made between ‘the Orient’ and (most of the time) ‘the
Occident’. Thus a very large mass of writers, among who are poets, novelists,
philosophers, political theorists, economists, and imperial administrators, have
accepted the basic distinction between East and West as the starting point for elaborate
accounts concerning the Orient, its people, customs, "mind," destiny, and so on. (...)
(...) in short, Orientalism as a Western style for dominating, restructuring, and having
authority over the Orient.(...)
Therefore, Orientalism is not a mere political subject matter or field that is reflected
passively by culture, scholarship, or institutions(...). It is rather a distribution of
geopolitical awareness into aesthetic, scholarly, economic, sociological, historical, and
philological texts; it is an elaboration not only of a basic geographical distinction (the
word is made up of two unequal halves, Orient and Occident) but also of a whole
series of ”interests” which, by such means as scholarly discovery, philological
reconstruction, psychological analysis, landscape and sociological description, it not
only creates but maintains.”9
9
Ibidem, pages 1, 2, 3, 12.
7
These long but necessary citations illustrate Said’s approach that is interdiscipinar
combining analysis of literature, paintings and scientific dissertations with radically critical
character of his thinking. Taking his cue from the work of Jacques Derrida and Michel
Foucault (acknowledging the influence of the latter, but not the former), and from earlier
critics of western Orientalism such as A.L. Tibawi, who analyzed traditional visions of Arab
nationalism in European scientific literature, Said argued that all Western writings on the
Orient, and the perceptions of the East purveyed in them, are suspect, and cannot be taken at
face value. According to Said, the history of European colonial rule and political domination
over the East distorts the writings of even the most knowledgeable, well-meaning and
sympathetic Western ‘Orientalists’ (a term which he transformed into a pejorative epithet)
such as British Arabist Bernard Lewis . He argues that their claims to objective knowledge of
the Orient are simply claims to power.
“I doubt if it is controversial, for example, to say that an Englishman in India or Egypt
in the later nineteenth century took an interest in those countries which was never far
from their status in his mind as British colonies. To say this may seem quite different
from saying that all academic knowledge about India and Egypt is somehow tinged
and impressed with, violated by, the gross political fact – and yet that is what I am
saying in this study of Orientalism”.10
Edward Said’s analysis locates somewhere in the sphere of postmodern reflection, that
is related to Foucault’s ‘relation of power and oppression’. If Foucault wrote a lot about
oppression in terms of human’s sexuality, Said concentrates on relations between colonizer
and colonized, translates mechanisms of colonial discourse that are still actual (in Said’s view
American and Israeli strategies of propaganda continue experiences of British and French
colonialism). Even if Said’s book utilizes methods or approaches mainly rooted in theory of
literature and cultural studies (postcolonial studies), it can be useful for contemporary social
theory too. If postmodern paradigm of contemporary social theory does exist (what is not
certain), Orientalism could be seen as one of its examples. Total lack of respect for
boundaries between traditional scientific disciplines, usage of analysis of literature for
purposes of social critic – these factors make Said’s work convenient for postmodern
discourse.
10
Ibidem, page 11.
8
Said’s contention was that Europe had dominated Asia politically so completely for so
long, that in Orientalist writings a very considerable bias exists in even the most outwardly
objective of texts, a bias which most Western scholars would not even be able to recognise,
because it is part of their cultural make-up too. His contention was that the West has not only
conquered the East politically, but that Western scholars have appropriated the exploration
and interpretation of the Orient’s languages, history and culture for themselves. They have
written Asia’s past and constructed its myriad modern identities from a perspective which
takes Europe as the norm from which the ‘exotic’, ‘inscrutable’ Orient deviates. Said
concludes that Western writings about the Orient invariably depict it as an irrational, weak,
feminised ‘Other’, contrasted with the rational, strong, masculine West. Western writings are
about creating ‘difference’ between West and East, a difference which is attributed to the
existence of certain ‘essences’ in the Oriental make-up11. Having thus stated his central thesis,
the remainder of Orientalism consists mainly of examples from Western texts designed to
illustrate it. There is a mixture of different texts that there are under scrutiny: classical works
of Silvestre de Sacy and Ernest Renan, speeches of British politicians and colonial oficers as
Lord Cromer and Arthur James Balfour, famous Description of Egypt connected with
Bonaparte’s conquest of Egypt, memoirs of T.H. Lawrence and new orientalistic volumes
commenting Israeli nad American policy toward Arab communities.
Said’s work despite of many superb passages containing analysis of sources
demonstrates a big tendention to essentialize and homogenize the West and Western culture,
politics and science. The fiercest criticism of his views has come from academic orientalists
such as British arabist Bernard Lewis, historian of Middle East and Islam Albert Hourani and
Iraqi American specialist in political sciences Kanan Makiya who feel that their profession
has been unfairly treated and mystified. Bernard Lewis was among the scholars whose work
Said questioned in Orientalism and subsequent works. Other scholars, such as Maxime
Rodinson, Jacques Berque, Malcolm Kerr, Aijaz Ahmad and William Montgomery Watt also
regarded Orientalism as a deeply flawed account of Western scholarship
Said's academic critics argued that Said made no attempt to distinguish between the
writings of poets such as Goethe (who never even travelled in the East), novelists such as
Flaubert (who undertook a brief sojourn in Egypt), controversial scholars such as Ernest
11
Compare: entry Edward Said in: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia [Internet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism, May 2006].
9
Renan, and serious Orient researchers such as Edward William Lane who were fluent in
Arabic and produced work of considerable value: their common European origins and
attitudes, according to Said, overrode such considerations. Furthermore, Robert Irwin
(amongst others) has pointed out that Said had entirely ignored the fact that Oriental studies in
the 19th century were dominated by Germans and Hungarians, from countries which,
inconveniently for Said's purposes, did not possess an Eastern Empire12. Said is further
accused of creating a monolithic ‘Occidentalism’ to oppose to the ‘Orientalism’ of Western
discourse: he failed to make a distinction between Romanticism and Enlightenment thinking,
he ignored the widespread and fundamental differences of opinion amongst western scholars
of the Orient; he failed to acknowledge that many Orientalists (such as Sir William Jones)
were more concerned with establishing kinship between East and West than in creating
‘difference’, and had frequently made discoveries which would provide the foundations for
anti-colonial nationalism (even colonial excavations in Egypt could develope paradoxically
political consciousness of local Arab populations!). More generally, Said and his followers
have been criticised for making no distinction between Orientalism in the media and popular
culture and the work of Western scholars.
Finally, Said's critics argue that by making ethnicity and cultural background the test
of authority and objectivity in studying the Orient, Said drew attention to the question of his
own identity as a Palestinian, and as an American. Given his prominent position at the heart
of the American Academy (he was at one time President of the Modern Language
Association), his largely Anglophone upbringing and education at an elite school in Cairo,
and the fact that he spent his entire adult life in the United States, if one accepts Said's own
arguments that all representations are embedded in language and culture, it could
paradoxically suggest that he himself is also a representant of Orientalism. Said was also
criticized more generally for his and excessive using of ‘representation’ as crucial category
what is rather a kind of general criticism concerning ‘postmodern relativism’
Said’s supporters argue that these criticisms, even if correct, do not invalidate his basic
thesis, which still holds true for the 19th and 20th centuries and in particular for general
representations of the Orient in Western media, literature and film. They point out that Said
himself had acknowledged the limitations of his study in failing to address German
12
Citation from Robert Irwin, For Lust of knowing: The Orientalists and their enemies, Allen Lane, London
2006 pp159-160, 281-2822, taken from: entry Edward Said in: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia [Internet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orientalism, May 2006].
10
scholarship, and that in the 'Afterword' to the 1995 edition of his book he had convincingly (to
them) refuted his critics such as Bernard Lewis. Apart from his continuing importance in the
fields of literary criticism and cultural studies, his work has had particular influence on
scholars studying India, such as Gyan Prakash and on literary theorists such as Homi Bhabha
and Gayatri Spivak. Said’s methodology resulted also in some specified researches
concerning relations of power, exclusion and usage of stereotypes in description of social,
religious and ethnical groups, eg Polish social stratification after the collapse of Communist
regime (especially demonization of rural population, as backward, irrational and eager for
despotic forms of government, made by some right-wing and liberal publicists and scholars –
this phenomenon was analyzed by Polish sociologist Piotr Głuchowski who has been
extensively using in his research the term ‘nesting orientalism’ [domowy orientalizm]).
National and religious conflicts in the Balkans were also researched with references to
‘nesting orientalism’.
Said’s critics and supporters alike acknowledge the profound, transformative influence
which Orientalism has had across the spectrum of the Humanities including social sciences
and theory of literature - the former, however, allege that it has been almost wholly negative,
the latter that it was liberating. One of reactions on Said’s argumentation was also discussion
on the very term ‘Occidentalism’ that was often viewed as inversion of Said’s understanding
of ‘Orientalism’.
3. Occidentalism – Western or Eastern tradition?
In contemporary discussion occidentalism is defined as a term for stereotyped and
sometimes dehumanizing views on the so-called Western world, including Europe, the United
States, Australia and even modern Japan. The term was popularized by Ian Buruma and
Avishai Margalit in their book Occidentalism: the West in the Eyes of its Enemies (2004). The
notion was used earlier in some books, but with rather different meanings sometimes even as
a synonym of pro-Western attitude. Still, the term is not clear and even if the mentioned
dissertation works as embodiment of new understanding of occidentalism, there are other
explanations.
11
Ian Buruma – a professor of human rights, democracy and new media studies at Bard
College and Avishai Margalit – a professor of philosophy at the Hebrew University in
Jerusalem prepared interdisciplinar research that is in some way quite similar to Said’s
Orientalism. Buruma suggested that the book is not an attack on Edward Said but rather it
echoes his work13, because he did have one profound insight, which is that there was a view
of the non-Western world that was dehumanizing, that depicted non-Western people as less
than morally adult, childlike and cruel, which in some instances did indeed justify Western
imperialism. The idea was not to attack that notion but to show the flip side, that there is an
equally dehumanizing view of the West, or of what its enemies think the West represents.
Buruma defines also problems with understanding of occidentalists:
“The other misunderstanding is that we are somehow talking about critics of the West,
critics of American foreign policy or those who have an aversion to Hollywood
movies. That is not what we are about either. What we identify as Occidentalists are
not simply critics or haters of America or the West at large; it is people with such a
dehumanizing vision of what the West represents that they are prepared to commit
colossal violence and mass murder to further their ends. That is when it begins to
interest us”14
Buruma and Margalit argue that nationalist and nativist resistance to the West actually
replicates responses to forces of modernisation that have their roots in Western culture itself,
among both utopian radicals and nationalist conservatives who saw capitalism, liberalism and
secularism as destructive forces. They argue that while early responses to the West represent a
genuine encounter between alien cultures, many of the later manifestations of occidentalism
betray the influence on Eastern intellectuals of Western ideas, such as the supremacy of the
nation-state, the Romantic rejection of rationality and the alleged spiritual impoverishment of
the citizens of liberal democracies. They trace this to German Romanticism and to the debates
between the "Westernisers" and "Slavophiles" in 19th century Russia, asserting that similar
Ian Buruma, The Origins of Occidentalism, „The Chronicle”, 2th of June 2004 [Internet:
http://chronicle.com/free/v50/i22/22b01001.htm, May 2006].
14
Ian Buruma, Occidentalism: The West in the Eyes of Its Enemies, Edited transcript of remarks, 4/8/04,
Discussion in Carnegie Council Books (Merrill House, New York City) [Internet:
http://www.cceia.org/viewMedia.php/prmID/4465, May 2006].
13
12
arguments appear under differing guises in Maoism, Islamism, wartime Japanese nationalism
and other movements. Authors’ approach is presented in such definitions:
“Clearly, the idea of the West as a malign force is not some Eastern or Middle Eastern
idea, but has deep roots in European soil. Defining it in historical terms is not a simple
matter. Occidentalism was part of the counter-Enlightenment, to be sure, but also of
the reaction against industrialization. Some Marxists have been attracted to it, but so,
of course, have their enemies on the far right. Occidentalism is a revolt against
rationalism (the cold, mechanical West, the machine civilization) and secularism, but
also against individualism. European colonialism provoked Occidentalism, and so
does global capitalism today. But one can speak of Occidentalism only when the revolt
against the West becomes a form of pure destruction, when the West is depicted as
less than human, when rebellion means murder.
Wherever it occurs, Occidentalism is fed by a sense of humiliation, of defeat. Isaiah
Berlin once described the German revolt against Napoleon as <the original exemplar
of the reaction of many a backward, exploited, or at any rate patronized society, which,
resentful of the apparent inferiority of its status, reacted by turning to real or imaginary
triumphs and glories in its past, or enviable attributes of its own national or cultural
character>"15.
Methodology of Occidentalism: the West in the Eyes of its Enemies is as controversial
as it was in the case of Said. Examples create a mixture of many elements from different
cultures and historical periods.Western predecessors of Occidentalism as Oswald Spengler,
Aurel Kolnai and Houston Stewart Chamberlain are followed by radical left-wing
theoreticians (Frantz Fanon) and original Oriental scholars and politicians. For example,
Buruma and Margalit classify as Occidentalists supporters of such differentiated political
currents as Islamic fundamentalism (Sayyid Qutb) and Arab secular nationalism (Sati al-
Ian Buruma, The Origins of Occidentalism, „The Chronicle”, 2th of June 2004 [Internet: http://The Chronicle
2-6-2004 The Origins of Occidentalism.htm].
15
13
Husri)16. That’s true that these two approaches represent deep anti-Western sentiments but
their ideological approach is competely different and inside Middle Eastern societies
supporters of both attitudes are in the radical conflict. Despite of these controversial points we
could say that Buruma’s and Margalit’s view of Oriental literature on the West is not as
essential nad monolithic as Said’s interpretation of Western approaches to Orient. In one of
his seminars Buruma criticized the conception of the clash of civilizations:
“As far as the clash of civilizations, I am not a Huntingtonian. This is not a
fundamental clash of one civilization against another, because Al-Qa’ida does not
represent the Middle East or Arabs or Muslims any more than the Christian Coalition
or Southern Baptists represent the West. After all, in the West itself there are forms of
religious fundamentalism which are disturbing.
What I have described about Al-Qa’ida you can see in completely different cultural
contexts. Al-Qa’ida's visions remind me of the Aum Shinrikyo in Japan, the group of
quasi-Buddhists — often engineers and people from technical universities, who felt
that modern Japanese society was empty, without spirit, without soul, machine-like –
who wanted to foment a religious revolution to create a purer society. They had views
of Armageddon that are not so different from that of certain kinds of Christian
extremists”17.
Huntingtonian theory is often criticized as an example of ‘orientalism’ in Said’s sense
with its static vision of civilizations and utopian conviction about creation of IslamicConfucian connection in the future. Stein Tonnesson writes that Huntington’s approach is one
of possible ways of relation to the question East versus West in contemporary world. The
second option is the opposite one: to engage in intellectual critics of Western domination from
cultural and ethical perspective and it is the case of Said. The next possibility is Eastern
reaction on Western discourse and this approach is called by Tonnesson ‘occidentalism’18. It
is defined as “positive Arab response to Edward Said's critique of Western Orientalism”, so it
differs a lot from Buruma and Margalit’s approach.
Ian Buruma, Avishai Margalit, Okcydentalizm. Zachód w oczach wrogów, w przekładzie Adama Lipszyca,
Universitas, Kraków 2005, s. 146-149.
17
Ian Buruma, Occidentalism: The West in the Eyes of Its Enemies, Edited transcript of remarks, 4/8/04,
Discussion in Carnegie Council Books (Merrill House, New York City) [Internet:
http://www.cceia.org/viewMedia.php/prmID/4465, May 2006].
18
Stein Tonnesson, Orientalism, Occidentalism and Knowing about Others [Internet:
http://www.wmich.edu/dialogues/texts/orientalism.htm, May 2006].
16
14
The man who could be seen as a leader of this concept is professor Hassan Hanafi,
leader of the Institute of Philosophy of the University of Cairo and a former researcher at the
United Nations University in Tokyo. In 1992 he published a book about Occidentalism in
Arabic (Muqaddima fi ilm al-Istighrab [Introduction to the Science of Occidentalism,
Westernism]). Hanafi's project is to depict the Occident in the same way that Westerners used
to do it with the Orient with the purpose of recreating an independent Arabic intellectual
tradition (that is connected, as an example, with Ibn Khaldun, Medieval scholar who is
sometimes perceived as the father of modern Western sociology). Arabs must learn to
interpret the West the same way one does it with mice in the laboratory19. Hanafi believes that
the West is in decline. Asked about Francis Fukuyama's claim that History has come to its end,
Hanafi answers: “For Arabs, Africans, Latin-Americans, Asians, History has not ended. It has
perhaps not even started”20. History does not coincide in East and West. For Arabs, the
period that Westerners call “middle age” was the real Antiquity (Arabs call the period of
Caliphates – especially between 7th and 11th centuries – “the golden age of Arabs and Islam).
Now there is time for a renaissance.
Arabs, however, according to Hanafi can be creative if only they are liberated from the
mythical domination of the West, from the complex of being weak and inferior. Arabs must
not be fooled by the idea of a universal culture. The idea of a universal culture is a myth
destined to fool the dominated. This has been done by the ancient Egyptian civilization, later
by the Chinese, Hindus and by the Occident. Hanafi's project is to desanctify in the eyes of
the Arabs the Western gods: Kant, Hegel and Marx who are also the prophets of Arab
nationalism and socialism.
This example illustrates how ‘Occidentalism” can be understood in the reality of
postcolonial Arab science (but also we have to remember that it is European Tonnesson who
labels Hanafi’s work). The term itself became very popular in European and non-European
scientific discourse, there are dissertations and collections of essays concerning different
aspects and meanings of occidentalism eg Deborah Reed-Danahay’s essay on Occidentalism
19
20
Ibidem.
Ibidem.
15
in Bourdieu’s theory of practice (with the importance of opposition French-Kabyle) or Robert
Thornton’s article on the creation and imagining of ‘European” in Southern Africa21.
Thus, terms ‘Orientalism’ and ‘Occidentalism’ has had real impact on contemporary
social sciences. Said’s radical analysis, mainly associated with literature theory and cultural
studies, was important also for anthropologists, sociologists and specialists in political
sciences. Despite of criticism the work Orientalism was crucial in understanding that science
can represent tradition of cultural domination and that real exchange of ideas and
development of different East-West relationships has to be based on equality and mutual
respect. The discussion concerning Said’s book and its critics was not present only in Europe
but also in the Middle East and South Eastern Asia, colonial discourse was researched not
only by Western scholars, there were publications concerning this topic in Japan, Singapore,
India and other countries .
I’d like to finish my brief essay with the citation from Culture and Imperialism by
Edward Said that recapitulates dangers connected with postcolonial heritage, nationalistic
identities and homogenous descriptions of civilizations and cultures. Said’s words give
impression that experience of colonialism (and war with colonialism) infected colonized
people to the extent that contemporarily they can build their countries only on the idea of
exclusive nationalism, intolerance and oppression. .
“My Arab environment had been largely colonial, but as I was growing up you could
travel overland from Lebanon and Syria through Palestine to Egypt and points west.
Today that is impossible .... The past wasn't better, but it was more healthily
interlinked, so to speak; people were actually connected to one another, rather than
staring at one another over fortified frontiers. In many schools you would encounter
Arabs from everywhere, Muslims and Christians, plus Armenians, Jews, Greeks,
Italians, Indians, Iranians, all mixed up, all under one or another colonial regime, but
interacting as if it were natural to do so. .... The effort to homogenize and isolate
21
Two mentioned essays are contained in the collection: Occidentalism. Images of the West, ed. James G.
Carrier, Clarendon Press, Oxford 1995.
16
populations in the name of nationalism (not liberation) has led to colossal sacrifices
and failures .... Identity, always identity, over and above knowing about others”22.
22
Citation taken from: Stein Tonnesson, Orientalism, Occidentalism and Knowing about Others [Internet:
http://www.wmich.edu/dialogues/texts/orientalism.htm, May 2006].
17