Orientalism
Guest Lecture by Dr. Naveen Minai
History of Culture – Winter 2015
Indus Valley School of Art & Architecture
Context
During the 18th and 19th centuries, an
Orientalist was the name for an academic
expert who spoke the languages of the
East (The Orient), who specialized in art
and architecture and literature and music
from the East, who translated legal and
diplomatic documents for Western
European governments, collecting
antiquities for museums, and so on and so
forth.
Orientalist was a legitimate category of
expertise and knowledge
Orientalism (1978)
In 1978, Edward Said redefined
“Orientalism” to mean precisely the
politics and power in Western
Europe and then later, in the United
States, that produced something
called ‘the Orient’ or ‘the East,’ and
what effects these politics have
had.
Significance of Orientalism
Edward Said’s key text “Orientalism”(1978) has
provided a way of identifying, and analyzing cultural,
academic, and political representations that are racist
and sexist towards non-European communities and
histories. It helped to identify how such people were:
 marked as inferior, for example, barbaric or
uncivilized
 collapsed into one another, thereby erasing
differences of identity and history
 excluded from the legitimate production of
knowledge about their cultures and histories
Understanding the “Other”
 Other = the definition of someone who is not
you. The opposite of yourself.
 Self and Other are politically and socially
constructed categories. Other such
constructions are:
- race
- ethnicity
- language
- gender
- sexuality
- class
- religion
- nationality
What is “Discourse”?
 Discourse means the way a topic is talked
about and written about
 It is the set of meanings that is applied,
through the kind of language that is used
and the connotations or words
 Discourse is how a story is told, what
language and ideas you use to tell a story
 Example: Terrorist vs Freedom Fighter
Understanding “Orientalism”
 Orientalism = the construction of a binary,
of the East and the West, as polar
opposites of each other, culturally,
historically, politically, socially, and
intellectually.
 According to Said (1978), the Orient or
the East has been narratively invented by
the Occident or the West as “its deepest
and most recurring image of the Other,”
that is, all that the West is not.
 This means that the West becomes
centered, becomes the reference point
— which involves judgment and value
Where can we find orientalist
representations?
TV shows, Films, Literature
Public Opinion
Government Policies
Foreign Policy
Academia
What is Philic Orientalism?
 Philic Orientalism = the use of Orientalism
in cultural, political, and academic
representations by people who have
historically been identified as part of, or
from, the Orient
 Philic Orientalism = people who have
been identified as part of the East
reproduce the binary between the East
and the West, and create a sense of
superiority for the East