The aim of the study is to identify the areas of scholarship where Professor Edward Said's work 'Orientalism' (1978) has laid foundations for new forms of enquiry or where new approaches are being formulated replacing those seriously undermined by the book. The first category covers the production of what is referred to as 'postcolonial studies', the second deals with the attempts to find an alternative to orientalism.
The authoress attempts to analyze and reveal the context within which the discourse of Bollywood cinema came to exist. This discourse is related to the stereotypes of the East that are deeply rooted in the Western tradition, with the orientalism that still precedes critical thought. Orientalism is above all an auto commentary on the Western self, as reflected in the self 'Other'. The West creates itself through the contrast with the Orient. As a result we are dealing with a most interesting repetition: people of the Orient, although they do not construct 'orienatalistic' ideas, they take part in the line of Orientalistic thought created and propagated by the West, and repeat it. What we are dealing with here is not only economic but also ideological imperialism: Western critique of masala films using categories of a product, which forms part of the classic model of orientalistic thought on the Orient, into the model of the tempting exoticism. The authoress looks at this phenomenon through the prism of myth, as interpreted by Barthes and Propp. Bollywood cinema is infected by the West: the old myths are replaced by quasi-bourgeois myth-ideologies. What is created is new knowledge, hotchpotch of comments and new discourses, but they are created by the West.
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This essay, written for the Czech translation of Edward Said’s (1935–2003) Orientalism (1978), explores ways in which to apply Said’s concept to Slavic Studies. The author points out two key features. The first, the concept of ‘self-Orientalization’ (which the author uses in this context), indicates that Slavness (unlike Orientalism) is an activity developed chiefly within the community it relates to. Second, the concept signals that in certain circumstances among Slavs as a whole strategies develop that ‘Orientalize’ the individual parts among themselves (for example, the relations between Russian Slavdom and ‘south-central-European’ Slavdom). The author offers two examples in support of his premise: one, a contextual interpretation of Pushkin’s Klevetnikam Rossii (To the Slanderers of Russia, 1831); the other, an interpretation of intra-Slav tensions and the thematization of Slavness, which appeared during the preparations for the Slav Congress of 1908. In conclusion, the author states that the general inspiration of Said’s concept consists in the interdisciplinary exploration of the ways in which these ideas were formed, who formed them, and what was the longterm result.
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The author tries to answer the question to what extent the 'Japanese smile', which is so often described by Western authors, is an Oriental invention and to what degree it is actually rooted in the traditional Japanese cultural values. A definition was adopted according to which smile is a characteristic and easily recognisable mimic expression, which performs an important communicative function. Individual cultures can be different with respect to how smile is used in social life. The specific 'high context' communication, characteristic of the Far East, where not much has to be expressed by means of words because most information is contained in the context of the utterance, has been described. A hypothesis has been advanced that in such a situation smile will rarely be treated as a social signal, the meaning of which can be independent of the background. The most important part of the text is devoted to the description of hypothetical cultural scripts, which encourage or prevent from the use of smile in specific social situations. A relation between these scripts and the traditional values of Japanese culture, particularly those connected with the ideal of wa, i.e. social harmony, has been discussed. The author also tries to answer the question to what extent the etiquette of the Japanese smile is unique. The author concludes that the Japanese smile fits well into the cultural context of Japanese culture and stands out from other 'smiles of the Far East'.
The aim of the paper is to emphasize the specific features of Islam which distinguish it from other great civilizations of the contemporary world and which cause that Islam is treated like a separate formation different from the others regardless of the fact whether you look at it from the eastern or western part of the world. The analysis conducted by the author has a textual character and refers directly to the most important thoughts included in the book by Edward Said 'Orientalism' and especially - in the light of his critical approach to the methodology of research concerning extra - European civilizations. He indicates the essence of this criticism which has its source in the deficit of demand for reliable analysis of the phenomenon of Orient - so varied and - yet so different from the West. The author draws two conclusions: 1) Islam is an indirect hybrid-like civilization, oriental in its nature yet in the form similar to Mediterranean tradition which is close to the West ; 2) Islam like the West and unlike the other civilizations of Asia is a complete formula which is not only a religion but also a complete legal and state system in which religion is an instrument to keep social order. The West would cease to be the West if it stopped protecting individual human rights. Similarly, Islam would melt away if it stopped protecting its dominant principle of class-free formula of justice and its rigorous law of shariat which shapes everyday life of a pious Muslim. The author concludes that it is this complete but anti-western legal system which forms the major barrier for including the Muslim areas of Africa and Asia in the process of globalization.
The goal of this article is to describe and explain the ways how Balkan is constructed and perceived as a meta-geographical and metaphorical concept. The author discusses the flexibility of demarcation of the Balkan borders in the mental maps and the flexibility of the category of the Balkan as well. In this article it is assumed that the relation between “Europe” and “Balkan” is in fact the relation between the power centre and the periphery. Thus Balkan is orientalised and quasi-colonialized by the “Europe” through the mechanisms related to the power discourses, ways of reporting, thinking and perceiving the Balkan. Moreover, the author suggests that the final consequence of such discourses is manifested in the policy of the European institutions towards some Balkan countries. The author ́s argumentation is based on the comparison of orientalist and balkanist discourses and on the reactions to postcolonial studies that come from the Balkan researchers themselves.
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The paper focuses on the response of distinguished German indologist Wilhelm Halbfass to Edward Said's highly acclaimed but controversial book Orientalism (1979). Halbfass himself is the author of a path-breaking study titled Indien und Europa (1981)/India and Europe (1988), which explores the intercultural encounter of India and Europe, from pre-Alexandrian antiquity until the present. He relied on the German hermeneutical tradition represented by the work of Martin Heidegger and especially Hans-Georg Gadamer who had re-evaluated the notion of prejudice. Said and Halbfass represent two opposing interpretations of colonial intellectual history: the one stressing the violence of colonial intervention and at the other representing the hermeneutic conception of an authentic intercultural encounter. For Said, the systematic employment of Western power-knowledge obscured the human truth of the Orient. For Halbfass, in contrast, the structure of ‘power-knowledge' does not prevent a fruitful and meaningful encounter. Said's work has been reviewed and critiqued by many, including prominent orientalists, who are the target of the indictment. However, Halbfass's work and his reply to the Saidian critique of Oriental studies offer more than that. It proposes a constructive alternative to the discourse about non-Western cultures: a discourse with them.
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The aim of this paper is to demonstrate historically conditioned context of Weber's analysis of “religion of India”. Weber and his work is part of orientalistic discourse – Weber assumes then Western image of India, and reproduces and incorporates this image into sociological thinking. This text focuses on some elements of this image: caste system as the most important element of Hinduism, confidence to sacred texts and secret sexualism as opposite of noble official religion of intellectual elite. These stereotypes have helped the defence of notion of European exceptionalism, by which other cultures may not develop modern capitalism as the base of modernity.
Any attempt to survey the state of research into Romantic Orientalism in comparative studies runs into considerable difficulties for two reasons. One is the lack of a commonly shared meaning of the term 'Orientalism', the other is the unresolved dispute about the scope of the very field of comparative studies. This article notes a strong connection between Romantic Orientalism and the type of research goals and ambitions declared by the practitioners of comparative studies. It seems that in so far as virtually all Romantics evinced some interest in the Orient Orientalism would make an ideal subject of comparative research. This chimes in with the opinion of many scholars in the field who have repeatedly called for opening up their discipline to the non-European literary terrain. What is more important, Orientalism would not only broaden the perspective of comparative studies, but also provide a common research field for otherwise irreconcilable approaches.
The article presents images of the Turks in the Czech environment and their development in the last half century of the existence of the Ottoman Empire, namely from the 1870s to 1923. It analyses works that reacted to the Balkan uprisings and Russo – Turkish War of the 1870s, travel reports and literature written after the occupation of Bosnia-Herzegovina and briefly outlines the view of the Turks in scholarly literature, especially the emerging Oriental or Turkish studies. Attitudes to the Turks are placed in the context of relations with other ethnic and religious groups. The article points to the stereotypes and Orientalist ideas we encounter in works with Turkish themes.
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During the 17th century, orientalism entered the domain of European literature and art. In the Age of Enlightenment, many literary texts and paintings dealt with orientalist motifs such as the harem. This tendency was intensified in the course of the 19th century, especially in France, which intended to colonize the Maghreb. Colonialism was reflected also and often glorified in contemporary literature and art. In Femmes d´Alger dans leur appartement, Eugéne Delacroix familiarized the French with the concept of the Algerian harem. In 1954-1955 and therefore shortly after the outbreak of the Algerian War of Independence, Delacroix ´s painting served Pablo Picasso as a model for a series of paintings and lithographs. And in 1980, Assia Djebar transferred these pictorial representations of the Algerian harem into the verbal code in her collection of short stories entitled Femmes d´Alger dans leur appartement. In the epilogue of this collection, Djebar commented on Delacroix ś and Picasso ´s vision of the Arab women in order to draw attention to the actual situation of her female compatriots. For this reason, her intermedial transfer and her interpretations of Delacroix ś and Picasso ´s paintings are not impartial.
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This paper traces the development of British conceptualization of the European space by analyzing three anthropological or travel-writing works that represent three distinct periods in the history of the relationship between Britain and Eastern Europe: the Victorian era, the Cold War period, and the post-Cold War present. The aim of the paper is not to evaluate the anthropological validity of these works, which would be outside of the authoress's expertise. Taking Edward Said's Orientalism (1978) as its main theoretical reference, the study explores the degrees and kinds of orientalism present in the language of these works. The paper concludes by reflecting on the power embedded in the language of some EU documents, speeches and media releases concerned with the EU enlargement after the end of the Cold War.
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In numerous instances, in contemporary studies in East Central Europe, the orientalising clichés of the Enlightenment episteme still continue to proliferate. In works by Larry Wolff and Tony Judt the author recognizes examples of latent orientalism in the approach of Western humanities towards history and cultures of the nations and ethnic groups between Germany and Russia. Founded upon the a priori authority of the Western academia, such approach leaves the role of the hegemon out of account. This contributes to further marginalization of these societies, which in turn leads to the cementing of the inferiority complex, so characteristic for all postcolonial populations.
In his study, the author searches for the causes of polarized tension in our perception of the paired terms - East and West. He seeks reasons behind this acute dichotomy and points out the sources and manifestations of the so-called Orientalism and its specific form - Balkanism. Methodological blunders prevent us from reaching more deeply into the processes that are under way in two great Himalayan powers. China, which is no longer merely a developing country, has experienced a fourth decade of steady real economic growth. India has recently undergone massive changes, too.
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