Edward Said, a professor of literature by training, was influential in many academic fields during his time. Said was a professor in literature, but his influence spanned many academic fields. Orientalism is the only work of Said’s that has had a greater impact. Published nearly 40 years ago, it remains relevant in the modern world. This paper is a response to the central thesis of Orientalism. It is that the Middle East has been misrepresented by Western culture because it was represented in the beginning. Said’s later works and the dialogue surrounding Orientalism are all based on the concept of “representation”. This paper addresses two questions. The second question is: Do representations have any relevance for postcolonial theories?
The quote above is a short answer to your first question. Representation is the act of substituting actual experience and knowledge for a perceived reality that is based on interpreting history, politics, and culture. The truth is not always represented by representation, but it has been used to denigrate the West’s relationship to the Middle East over the centuries. The idea of Orientalism is relevant because representations are part of the ‘Orientalism.’ As another scholar stated, Said’s “comprehensive critique” of Western writers, particularly English, French, American and others, on the Middle East encompassed literature, history, politics and other disciplines (Halliday 145). As such, Representations form the foundation of an anti-imperialist and postcolonial view of the world.
The short answer is yes. They are important for postcolonial political theory because they influence everything, from foreign policy to economics. The discussion reveals that the cultural empire of modernity (which manifests itself in representations), is as real today as it was before. This political theory paper is not an attempt to summarize Said’s entire work. Nor does it offer a definitive opinion on Said theories or their value. The discussion focuses on the theory and its relevance to modern politics. Overall, the discussion highlights representation as cultural critique of contemporary established disciplines and discursive forms.
First, we need to understand what Said actually means by’representation.’ Said is an accomplished writer who explains the evidence and his theoretical framework in a way that is clear and concise. Said’s words summarize the best understanding as to how representation relates to the necessary yet tenuous relationship that exists between the Western and Middle East. It is not meant to imply that data or facts are absent, but rather that the importance of facts is determined by how they are interpreted. This is a description’representation,’ in relation to the whole world. For example, knowledge of George Washington depends upon the culture, political system, nation-state, and many other factors. Said is making a point that the West does not have any first-hand experience of Middle East society. This is true whether it is an American or British historian. Said says the’real knowledge’ of the Middle East does exist, but that it is subject to interpretation.
Said does not make a critique of the human interpretive process as a collective. This is why’representation,’ as a term of art, has more to do with West and East than it does with West and East. Said writes, “Unlike Americans…the French and British…have a tradition of Orientalism. This is a way to understand the Orient based upon the Orient’s special place in European Western culture” (20). Said’s scholastics work is based on his belief that Western nations – France and Great Britain primarily – are shaped not by today’s reality, but by what they thought it meant to relate to the Orient in the past. It’s not surprising that even though the notion of ‘Orientalism’ has existed for over a century, it is still rooted in cultural norms. Said clarifies his point. He says that the “cultural discourse and exchanges within a particular culture” must make it clear that they are not conveying ‘truths’, but rather representations. The cultural exchange between two cultures is based on the representation of each culture, whether accurate or not. Said argues that this representation is not based on current reality, but rather on “institutions and conventions” as well as on “codes of understanding agreed upon in the past”. Said’s definition of representation is: He means to say that Westerners, in order to understand the Middle East properly, have had to depend on the West. It has resulted in a sort-of tautological body of knowledge, which isn’t very useful.
Said may be saying that, rather than expanding knowledge and understanding, representations tend to decrease it. “Notice how easily ‘Arabs’accept the transformations or reductions…that he has to endure” (285). This is not the best way to approach knowledge or to apply it. It can have a negative impact on the Middle East and the relationships between Western nations. Said believes this to be harmful for academia as well, which is important because representations come from historical interpretation. Said’s explanation of the term is made even clearer by examining how representation can take different forms. Said argues that these include “cultural relationships policy”, reducing Middle East culture to “only Islam”, as well as making ‘the Orient” the center of postcolonial international economics and relations (Said 293). Said then goes on to explain that modern investments in the Middle East are “built on sand”, because experts guide policy on the basis marketable abstractions including political elites, stability, modernization – which is a repackaging of old Orientalist stereotypes in policy jargon. Said does not simply mean that representation refers to the historical treatment of the East by the West in academic texts, political speeches and economic choices such as development and investment. This is not a historical issue, but a current one that touches on the very core of how Westerners tend to view the Middle East. They see it as a totally different culture with only a few things in common.
This last aspect to the term representation brings us to the second question of this article: Why is the theoretical framework Said developed over half a decade ago still relevant to modern society, even though we have moved on from colonial days? Said’s works are aimed at demonstrating that the representation of East-West cultural exchange is a current and future issue. The term’representation’ has so far been used mainly in reference to colonial countries of the past such as France and Great Britain. It is important to remember that representations did not disappear with the end of colonialism. This cultural approach persisted in the Western mind, but in an unconsciously insidious way.
Since World War II the United States is also a part of the representational approach in understanding its own relationship to the Middle East. Said explains that “a vast net of interests now connects all of the former colonies to the United States. This is similar to how a proliferation in academic subspecialties separates (and at the same time, unites) the former philological-based and European disciplines such as Orientalism.” The West’s colonial influence over the United States was not limited to the military and political state of affairs. This was mostly because the cultural component of colonialism had been allowed to persist, and was part of Western culture. Said says that the Arab has been given a lot of attention by the academic community, the worlds of policy planners and business in the years following World War II. Said goes on to say that in the decades following World War II, “the Arab Muslim has become a figure in American popular culture. In the academic world, the policy planner’s world and the business world are all paying very serious attention to the Arab” (284). Said’s powerful conclusion to this section of discussion is: “A large variety of hybrid images of the Orient roam the culture today.” Islam and the Arabs have their own representations…and we shall treat them here as they occur in that fragmentary – yet powerfully and ideologically coherent – persistence, a far less frequently discussed one, into which, in the United States, traditional European Orientalism disbursed itself.” In other words, representations remain powerful in culture, politics, and historical dialogue because they shift the ideological focus of anyone engaging with them. This theory is sound. It’s easy to imagine a cultural image in the United States of the ‘Arab’, whether it be an individual Arab or a Middle Eastern country. It is for this reason that representations remain powerful.
Said continues by saying that it’s impossible to ignore the fact that “even if we disregard the Orientalist distinctions between ‘them,’ and us, a powerful series of political and ultimately ideological realities inform scholarship today” (327). Said says that despite the Orientalist distinctions of ‘them,’ “a powerful series” of political and ideological realities still informs scholarship today (327). He outlines divisions such as East/West and North/South. Other divisions include white/colored people, those who have/do not have, and others (Said, 327). Said’s work is not only a critique of Western culture, but also of its relationship and representation of the Middle East. The problem of representation persists in modern times, even when postcolonial structures are in place, because almost everything is political. The first step towards overcoming this influence is to acknowledge that representation is used in almost every discipline.
This paper examines the concept of representation and cultural exchange. It includes both the meaning and definition of the term, as well as an overview of its relevance today, even though colonial times are long gone. The paper shows that Said’s questions are not only valid, but also crucial to ensure that historians don’t repeat history. This paper has clarified that Said’s term has no relation to imperialism as it is understood in the military and economic sense. It has to do instead with the cultural empire that has shaped world history since World War II. This type of imperialism may also have a similar negative impact on the global community if left unchecked. It is important to question the images that are being presented.
