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November 15, 2006
Eddie Said: Speaking Ill of the Dead
The late Edward Said helped turned me into a reassessor of the Near East and its people. No, not Orientalism, which I only (pretended to) read a few years ago. It was more the outcroppings of common sense amidst the lefty hyperintellectual verbiage - the Edward Said who was basically saying "quit calling me camel jockey, and give me my home back, and evaluate people's behavior as you would your own." One finds this in Covering Islam (which did influence me) and various parts of his writings over the years. Along now comes an author to trash Orientalism, with Said dead and all. Michael Dirda from the Washington Post summarizes the allegations, selected below.
Robert Irwin, himself an Oxford-trained Arabist, . . . asserts in his introduction and argues in his penultimate chapter that Said's book, thinking and evidence are shoddy, unreliable and mean-spirited. The Columbia literary critic's attack on Orientalism, Irwin argues, maligns the lifework of admirable and deeply learned people, mocks a long, honorable tradition of scholarship, and plays fast and loose with the facts. Dangerous Knowledge is in part, then, Robert Irwin's riposte to Edward Said.
I probably wouldnt agree. Many of the old and new orientalists were indeed people on an exotics fetish, and perfectly willing to promote into the subordination of others. But I did feel when skim--, I mean reading Orientalism, that Said gave a greatly stilted view of the writers, scholars, adventurers, and colonial agents he covered. I doubt they were all the relentless purveyors of empire-funded racism, as he portrays. But will have to look to irwin's book to tell. Heads up, anyway, to those interested in the subject.
Posted by Matthew Hogan at November 15, 2006 06:45 PM
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Comments
You of all people ought to appreciate this...in a supremely random bit of geekiness, in grad school I was once forced by an ancient prof who had been hauled out of (much-needed) retirement to teach an introductory survey course to write a book report on Covering Islam. I can't remember a damn thing about the book anymore, but the report was titled "What Said Said."
Posted by: Eva Luna ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://matthew.aqoul.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at November 15, 2006 09:49 PM
Today it might be "What Dead Ed Said".
Posted by: matthew hogan at November 15, 2006 10:55 PM
It's been years since I read Orientalism or Covering Islam, and I read them probably through a haze of hero-worship, but I thought the flaws in the Orientalism argument had been fairly thoroughly hashed out and critiqued by other (even politically-sympathetic) academics. Irwin's book seems to come a bit late, and judging by extracts and reviews, is more interesting for its own (fascinating)stories than for any particularly original critiques.
A couple of red flags from the reviews, though - Irwin apparently does not talk about Bernard Lewis except in the most fawning terms, inexplicably leaves out his role in advising the Bushies on Iraq, does not discuss orientalists who helped the US plan Mossadegh's downfall, and startlingly, claims that Macaulay never visited India. Christopher de Bellaigue's review in LRB was full of such juicy details.
Posted by: SP at November 16, 2006 03:02 AM
SP -- Thanks for the details and heads up. Dirda's own sympathetic reference to Bernard Lewis was a red flag I did not get into, too.
Posted by: matthew hogan at November 17, 2006 06:52 AM
I skimmed Irwin's book in the bookstore. His attack on Said is overboard but he dances between accusing him of wilfull dishonesty and merely reporting others' accsations of it. More than that, however, he explicitly accuses Said of talking out of both sides of mouth on terrorism.
In both cases, Irwin appears wrong and hostile but not unreasonably so. One thing that did impress me, perhaps because I agreed with him, was to note that Said is clearer and more valid when he focuses directly on anti-Palestinian bias in the US media, which Irwin also states/agrees is excessive and unjustified.
Interesting.
He comes across not entirely as a conventional Bernard Lewisite in that section.
Posted by: matthew hogan at November 20, 2006 01:37 AM
