askchapo

Orientalism is not just a set of stereotypes, but an institution for the production of knowledge. is is the creation, defining, and imagining of "The orient" which conditions knowledge of the orient with domination of the orient. this link between knowledge production and state projects was to authorize a kind of bird's-eye view of the non-Western world, one that positioned the knowing observer as superior in every respect (more rational, logical, scientific, realistic, and objective) to the object of contemplation.

"Said also suggested that there was no simple way out of the orientalist's discourse, that one could not simply substitute "true" representations of the Orient for "false" ones. This is so because representations are more than simply passive reflections of reality. Rather, they contribute to the production of the real. This has especially been the case in a situation where epistemological issues were conjoined with the physical power and resources at the command of imperial states. As the works of those who followed Said have shown, imperial projects constructed an Orient that mimicked orientalist representations, and these constructs were, in turn, recovered by later generations of Western scholars as proof of the timeless regularities of the East"