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Orientalism Paperback – October 12, 1979

by Edward W. Said (Author)
4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 1,945 ratings
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A groundbreaking critique of the West's historical, cultural, and political perceptions of the East that is—three decades after its first publication—one of the most important books written about our divided world. 

"Intellectual history on a high order ... and very exciting." —The New York Times

In this wide-ranging, intellectually vigorous study, Said traces the origins of "orientalism" to the centuries-long period during which Europe dominated the Middle and Near East and, from its position of power, defined "the orient" simply as "other than" the occident. This entrenched view continues to dominate western ideas and, because it does not allow the East to represent itself, prevents true understanding.

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  1. Print length
    368 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Vintage
  4. Publication date
    October 12, 1979
  5. Dimensions
    5.16 x 0.87 x 7.98 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    039474067X
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0394740676
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Intellectual history on a high order ... and very exciting." —The New York Times

"Powerful and disturbing.... The theme is the way in which intellectual traditions are created and transmitted." —The New York Review of Books

"Stimulating, elegant yet pugnacious.... Said observes the West observing the Arabs, and he does not like what he finds." —The Observer

"An important book.... Never has there been as sustained and as persuasive a case against Orientalism as Said's." —Jerusalem Post

From the Inside Flap

The noted critic and a Palestinian now teaching at Columbia University,examines the way in which the West observes the Arabs.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Vintage; First Ed. edition (October 12, 1979)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 368 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 039474067X
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0394740676
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.31 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.16 x 0.87 x 7.98 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 1,945 ratings

About the author

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Edward W. Said

Edward W. Said

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Edward W. Said was University Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Royal Society of Literature and of Kings College Cambridge, his celebrated works include Orientalism, The End of the Peace Process, Power, Politics and Culture, and the memoir Out of Place. He is also the editor, with Christopher Hitchens, of Blaming the Victims, published by Verso. He died in September 2003.

Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
4.6 out of 5
1,945 global ratings
The Persistence of Western Arrogance
4 Stars
The Persistence of Western Arrogance
How the West views the other parts of the world is in constant flux and while things have improved, the stereotypes of those living in Asia and other non- Western regions are still widely held. A book that tackles this perception head- on is the classic Orientalism, written by Edward Said.To start the reader off, this book defines some of the terms that are important to know before you begin. What exactly is Orientalism? What does it mean to refer to someone or something as Occident? What is philology? These and other terms need to be understood before you begin to read. Some are more clearly defined than others so don’t be surprised if you need to consult the internet for clarification.Next, the book launches into its study of western perceptions of the Orient. To summarize, the Western assumptions and opinions about the Orient and its people are short sighted, ignorant, and mostly degrading. This has been the case throughout history. Residents of the Orient are viewed as people in need of help; in need of occupation by a Western power so that they may improve. This unfounded arrogance has been the norm for much of history and to a degree, it is still in place today.Orientalism is an intellectual read, to be certain. It’s not an easy book to complete, as it often reads like a textbook. I often found myself having to go back and re- read a section or two, to fully grasp what is being talked about. Part 2 of the book, Orientalist Structures and Restructures, was particularly difficult to get through. The cross examination of written works by different authors and the general tone in this section, I found difficult to read. I continuously lost my focus and had to go back.Overall, Orientalism is a solid book and an important book. It’s not the type of book you would want for a day of light reading, and much of what the book emphasizes, namely the overt arrogance of the West and our attitude of superiority toward the East, is uncomfortable to read, even though its mostly true, even today. It may take time to finish, but there is much wisdom to be gained in Orientalism and it thus earns an easy recommendation.
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Adrian Lambrinos
5.0 out of 5 stars As important and relevant today as it's ever been
Reviewed in the United States on April 22, 2024
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Written with both academic and intellectual bravery, Said lays out decades of analysis of a decrepit and western chauvinist discipline known as Orientalism. Effectively relegating it to where it belongs - the dustbin! Said walks you through the appropriation of the eastern world by oxidant imperial forces of the colonizing west to bring forth Orientalists clear motives - to lay claim to vast areas of cultural wealth for itself and only itself. Said demonstrates revolutionary epistemology with his approach to Orientalism and thus has reshaped how we should view the near, middle, and far east. The devastating impact of Orientalism can be seen writ large upon current events when one adapts Said's lens. Read this book! Share it with your friends!
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Gavin Young
5.0 out of 5 stars A staple for any thinker today
Reviewed in the United States on September 14, 2023
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Said’s Orientalism is a staple that bridges the gap between several discourses and academic studies including Post-colonial studies, Cultural Theory, Critical Theory, Literary Theory, and countless others. Paradoxically, however, Said’s main criticism is aimed at such cemented academic fields, epitomized by Orientalism, the field aimed at studying the Orient from a Western perspective. Said’s underlying question is stated near the end of the book (~p.300): “How can we come to understand other cultures?” This seemingly simple question proliferates a very dangerous assumption: that culture stands out there as some pre-social object waiting to be apprehended by the rational subject (namely, the Westerner). As Said shows, and in a way he explicitly states as being indebted to Foucault, that culture is constructed principally through the discursive operations of a particular subject. To *be* an Oriental is to embody certain assumptions which become proliferated by a discourse (Orientalism) whose construction is such that it is essentially unfalsifiable. As Said aptly points out, the Oriental (a term we stray from using today for its obviously racist undertones which Said carefully traces across modern history and in the history of colonialism) is put into a position where he is to embody contradictory qualities simultaneously such that his identity is always one of negativity, an instrumental object for the purposes of the Westerner’s use: lacking in rationality yet containing the birth of our modern sciences and religious traditions, disorganized yet forming vast networks of control (apropos the Caliphate), static and forever solidified as a continuous identity that can be understood whilst simultaneously being unwieldy and schizophrenic in their diversity. All of these are used to back the Oriental into a corner such that he is merely a tool which can be utilized by the Westerner.

I think many of those who are keen on criticizing Said as “painting with too broad of strokes” (such was another review here on Amazon claiming that he was too harsh on Bernard Lewis’ appraisal of Arabic philologically) have not fully understood his project, which is that if we trace Orientalism back, understanding it as a *discourse* (in the Foucaultian sense), we are able to extrapolate certain recurring themes that identify why it seems that Orientals can always somehow appear as racist stereotypes — it is precisely because their image through Western blinders has manufactured the Oriental’s inevitability viz the image.

All being said, this is an indispensable text for Post-colonial studies, as well as being instrumental for studies of literary theory, critical theory, and certain strands of poststructuralist/postmodern thought (Foucault, Derrida, even Deleuze). It ready fairly fast and, although it is slow at certain points when he starts to sound like a broken record, his prose is fairly consistent in being engaging and effectively communicating his desired point. An important positive that makes this book more accessible than other Post-colonial material is that it is not very theoretically dense as opposed to someone like Homi Bhabha. Instead, Said opts for a more historically vast characterization of the problem that still provides the same theoretical points whilst allowing the complexity of his point — that identity is not latent within objects and existing pre-socially, instead existing only within a discourse build on implicit power-imbalances — to shine through to those who may not want or be ready for a text of more abstract a nature. All and all, this is a great text that, even as a slow reader, was finished quickly and was extremely enjoyable and valuable, opening up a new area of study in a way that allows one to access a whole new problematic that may have previously appeared only as invisibility.
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GEORGE POKORNY
5.0 out of 5 stars Recycled in bad condition library book.
Reviewed in the United States on April 11, 2024
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Very disappointed with condition of this obviously (marked out name of public library) stolen book-misrepresented condition of heavily used book.
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Thomas
5.0 out of 5 stars 25th anniversary addition gives great modern context. This is a terrific read.
Reviewed in the United States on January 5, 2024
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Edward Said is one of the best and brightest of his time. I thoroughly enjoyed the book as it provided broad scope explaining Occidentalism and Orientalism. It'd be nice to have some of the longer quotes translated, although looking up words DID help me brush up more on my French!
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John M. Balouziyeh
4.0 out of 5 stars Misdirected Criticism at Orientalist Scholars
Reviewed in the United States on May 17, 2014
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a) Overview
In his seminal work Orientalism, Edward Said argues that western scholarship on the Arab and Muslim world and its history, culture, politics and institutions is tainted by subtle Eurocentric prejudices against Arab and Islamic peoples, whose world and culture are depicted as inferior to the West. For Said, western “pseudo-scholars” who report on the Arab world portray the Arabs as exotic, temperamental and irrational, presenting the Orient through the colored, racist lens of Orientalism.

b) Critique
Said’s work is weak in several respects, namely in its criticism of scholars who objectively depict the reality of the modern Arab world and in its use of unnecessarily complex prose that obstructs rather than furthers Said’s message.

(1) Said’s Critique of Scholars Who Depict Reality
(a) Overview
Said may be disgruntled over how scholars of Middle Eastern studies depict and describe the Arab world’s modern state of disarray and disorder, but these scholars are doing nothing more than depicting reality. When scholars reference poor human development indices in the Middle East, high rates of illiteracy, political corruption, social instability, unemployment and economic underdevelopment, they are reporting on objective facts supported by institutions such as the World Bank. Oppression of minorities, violations of human rights and political freedom, usurpation of power by the use of armed force and political coups in the Arab world are not only well-documented by international human rights organizations, but candidly obvious to any objective observer. Therefore, when scholars depict these facts in their work, they are not selectively choosing that which most bleakly portrays the Middle East in order to justify a sense of Eurocentric superiority. Rather, they are depicting a political, economic and social reality.
If scholars of the Arab world were really out to discredit Arabs and Muslims, as Said suggests, then one would not find in their literature praise where praise is due. How then is one to explain, for example, Lewis’s praise on the learning, scholarship, tolerances and openness to scientific inquiry and invention that characterized the Muslim world of the Middle Ages? Lewis even points out that it was Muslim nations that welcomed persecuted minorities that fled Europe in the Middle Ages, including even Jews. Lewis cannot be so positive of the state of affairs of the modern Middle East. To do so would be to betray a reality of political violence, religious fanaticism and social and economic underdevelopment that cannot be denied by objective observation.

(b) Example: Said’s Critique of Bernard Lewis
As an example of Said’s misplaced critique of scholars for depicting reality, we can consider one of the book’s many attacks on Bernard Lewis. In one example, Said quotes Lewis’ essay “Islamic Concepts of Revolution,” which defines the Arabic word thawra (revolution), as follows (p. 314-15):
“The root th-w-r in classical Arabic meant to rise up (e.g. of a camel), to be stirred or excited, and hence, especially in Maghrabi usage, to rebel. It is often used in the context of establishing a petty, independent sovereignty; thus, for example, the so-called party kings who ruled in eleventh century Spain after the break-up of the Caliphate of Cordova are called thuwwar (sing. Tha’ir). The noun thawra at first means excitement, as in the phrase, cited in the Sihah, a standard medieval Arabic, intazir hatta taskun hadhihi ’lthawra, wait till this excitement dies down—a very apt recommendation.”

Said mounts an offensive against Lewis, claiming that Lewis’s definition of the Arabic term is “full of condescension and bad faith” (p. 315). He continues (p. 315):
“Why introduce the idea of a camel rising as an etymological root for the modern Arab revolution except as a clever way of discrediting the modern? Lewis’s reason is patently to bring down revolution from its contemporary valuation to nothing more noble (or beautiful) than a camel about to raise itself from the ground. Revolution is excitement, sedition, setting up a petty sovereignty—nothing more; the best counsel (which presumably only a Western scholar and gentleman can give) is ‘wait till the excitement dies down.’”

Said’s argument is flawed in several respects. Lewis, in describing the verb th-w-r as meaning “rising up” or being “stirred or excited” is simply setting forth the various definitions of the term as recorded in any standard dictionary. For example, the Fourth Edition of the Hans Wehr Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic notes that the verb can mean “to stir, be stirred up, be aroused, be excited… be unleashed, break out; to revolt, rebel, rise … to rage, storm … to fly into a rage, become furious … to agitate, excite … to stimulate … to arouse … kindle … provoke … infuriate … stir up dust … incite ... infuriate” (p. 130). Said may not be happy that the Arabic verb for revolt is associated these other, base meanings, but for this he should direct his anger at the Arabic language, not at Lewis, who is merely presenting the facts.
Second, Said sarcastically attributes the recommendation to “wait till this excitement dies down” to a “Western scholar and gentleman,” as though it is the scholar Lewis who is recommending that Arabs not exercise their duty of resistance to bad government. Yet Lewis is merely citing the Sihah, a standard medieval Arabic dictionary written by Isma'il ibn Hammad al-Jawhari, of Turkestan, which was later incorporated into Lisān al-ʿArab by Ibn Manzur, of North African descent. If Said is not happy with what Lewis finds in Arabic and Muslim sources, he should direct his disapproval at the sources, not at Lewis.

(2) Unnecessarily Complex Prose
A second flaw in Orientalism and of Said’s work in general is the overly complex style of prose that Said is apt to adopt. While scholars such as Lewis employ flowing, eloquent language that clearly expresses their views that is also a pleasure to read, Said employs verbose, unnecessarily convoluted sentences and ambiguous phrases that often require his audience to read and reread them before deciphering their meaning. His complex prose thus impedes rather than furthers his message. This is perhaps why Said’s impact has been largely restricted to academia, while several of Lewis’s books reached broader audiences and went on to be New York Times or National Bestsellers.

c) Said’s Qualifications in Middle Eastern Studies
Said’s volume repeatedly assails the scholars of Middle Eastern studies. He writes of Lewis, for example, that his “verbosity scarcely conceals both the ideological underpinnings of his position and his extraordinary capacity for getting nearly everything wrong” (p. 342). Said goes even further, challenging the credentials and objectivity of these scholars. In an interview with Al-Ahram Weekly, Said claimed that Bernard Lewis “knows something about Turkey, I'm told, but he knows nothing about the Arab world.”
One is left wondering about Said’s own credentials in Middle Eastern studies. With a PhD in English literature, Said’s qualifications prove to be relatively thin. While Orientalism draws on Said’s knowledge of colonial literature, literary theory, and post-structuralist theory, it is questionable whether Said has the necessary training or credentials to approach Middle Eastern studies against scholars who have been specifically trained in the field. Lewis, for example, holds a BA and PhD from the School of African and Oriental Studies in history with special reference to the Middle East and Islam and a Diplôme des Études Sémitiques from the University of Paris and has had a prolific academic career spanning sixty years of specialization in Middle Eastern studies.
Furthermore, the reader may be left wondering whether Said, an American of Palestinian origin, is balanced in assessing the Middle East and the question of Palestine, or whether his writing perhaps suffers from a similar degree of bias as the Orientalists that he attacks.

d) The Book’s Failure to Discredit Scholars of Middle Eastern Studies
While Said’s Orientalism has had a major polarizing and ripple effect over academia, the book does not succeed in discrediting western scholars of Middle Eastern studies. Rather, it often leaves Said looking oversensitive, fastidious and overly eager to pick a fight.
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Yasar Erdi Sasmaz
5.0 out of 5 stars Good
Reviewed in Canada on October 18, 2023
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Good
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Karen
5.0 out of 5 stars Great service, great book
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 26, 2023
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Very good service and brilliant book. Very pertinent right now.
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luqman
5.0 out of 5 stars Great
Reviewed in India on January 3, 2023
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Great. A splendid work of research
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Alba
5.0 out of 5 stars Libro en perfecto estado
Reviewed in Spain on February 24, 2022
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El libro llegó antes de lo esperado y en muy buen estado.
Está bien pero al leerlo mucho rato seguido se hace pesado y hay partes que no se entiende nada, es muy específico y hay muchos nombres y detalles.
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Sergio
3.0 out of 5 stars Book's a classic; beware of the print
Reviewed in Italy on February 9, 2022
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The book is a classic - Said's approach is nuanced and could serve us well in our time. Nothing to complain about.

That said, what I take issue with is the bad print of this edition: obviously the price is competitive, so I wasn't expecting anyhing spectacular, but I expected at least to be able to clearly read the words. The ink is all smudged and the words are blurry, some pages being even worse than others. Nothing is unreadable, per se, but it's hard enough to read that the eye gets tired pretty quickly. It feels like reading an old timey tome or newspaper.
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