Orientalisms

Catalog description

How did the familiar, powerful, and problematic narratives of civilizations emerge that pit the "East" against the "West"? What are their consequences? Where and how have they been resisted? The course will analyze texts, events, images, and places that were influential in shaping these representations of the Orient/East, as well as key efforts, including Edward Said's, to outline the political consequences of such narratives. How was the Orient first encountered, written about, and even "produced" by European adventurers, travelers, and artists who "discovered" and "described" the people and places of the "East" in the 18th and 19th centuries? How did the travel writings, paintings, photographs, monuments, and museums that resulted both narrate the Other and simultaneously construct the "West" as well? Carefully considering Said's important theorization of Orientalism and a range of responses to it, the course will extend the applicability of these concepts to regions beyond the Middle East, especially South Asia, Southeast Asia, and East Asia, and will also consider such topics as gender, ethnography, aesthetics, and the shaping of post-colonial identities.