Welcome Intruder Into Our Culture

What?: Said begins one of his pieces by writing about a French journalist who went to Beirut during the civil war of 1975–1976 who regrets his time spent there. The author does not make it clear as to why except he hints about the French journalist missing the element of the Orient. Soon the audience discovers that the French journalist wanted to witness the mystery, culture, and lifestyle of the Orient instead of seeing Beirut in distress, “the Orient was almost a European invention, and had been since antiquity a place of romance, exotic beings, haunting memories and landscapes, remarkable experiences. Now it was disappearing; in a sense it had happened, its time was over” (Said, 1). Said then explains about the three different, yet connected meanings of Orientalism in this piece.

The first meaning of Orientalism had to do more with academics. He notes that when talking about Orientalism and the Orientals, he is referring to the university level. The excerpt states that white French scholarly men went to the East (today known as the Middle East) to observe different cultures and then become experts on the study of those Orientals. When those same men came back to Europe, they would report their findings/ discoveries. However, they did not always portray the Orients accurately. The experience and observations that the French Scholars make about one person in that culture can’t and doesn’t represent every single Orientals from that community. Essentially those privileged and lucky enough to travel to form their own understanding and thought of other cultures unintentionally created groups of people as the other, which forced people in the East to be outsiders. Said put forth that, “anyone who teaches, writes about, or researches the Orient — and this applies whether the person is an anthropologist, sociologist historian, or philologist — either in its specific or its general aspects, is an Orientalist, and what he or she does is Orientalism” (Said, 2).

The second meaning of Orientalism that Said describes is that, “Orientalism is a style of thought based upon an ontological and epistemological distinction made between “the Orient” and (most of the time) “the Occident” (Said, 2). This means that the second definition is about the comparisons and the contrast that the East and West have made in regards to Orientalism and the Orient. Said’s main point is that the East and West had distinctions that caused Orientalism to occur because of the comparisons and contrasting. Poets and writers from the West illustrate a visual story out of the observations of the researchers, to try and convey/ portray a better visual of what the culture in the East is like. Many times the poets and writers will base their work on what they think they know versus what they do know about people and the culture in the East. For example, when we think of the middle east we think of the people as terrorist and dangerous, however, poets or writers might take that aspect of their culture and will paint a happier non-realistic picture about those Orientals.

Lastly, Said defines Orientalism as a discourse, a discourse which is connected to power. He states that, “… Orientalism can be discussed and analyzed as the corporate institution for dealing with the Orient — dealing with it by making statements about it, authorizing views of it, describing it, by teaching it, settling it, ruling over it: in short, Orientalism as a Western style for dominating, restructuring, and having authority over the Orient” (3). All the author is pointing out is that the Western culture/ society holds a lot of power when discussing the discourse of Orientalism. The West thinks that we are better than the East, which is one way that we portray the discourse. Specifically, when talking about Orientalism, those people (professors or researchers) have a lot of power when they return back from their studies. They may have observed the Orients doings one way, but in reality that action that the Orient took has a different meaning all together. Proving that going into another group’s environment and culture and reporting back on it is a form of power and oppression, because the Orients do not always have a chance to fight back on the information being provided to other countries. Overall, Said concludes his last meaning of Orientalism by saying, “moreover, so authoritative a position did Orientalism have that I believe no one writing, thinking, or acting on the Orient could do so without taking account of the limitations on thought and action imposed by Orientalism. In bride, because of Orientalism the Orient was not (and is not) a free subject of thought or action. This is not to say that Orientalism unilaterally determines what can be said about the Orient, but that it is the whole network of interests inevitably brought to bear on (and therefore always involved in) any occasion when that peculiar entity “the Orient” is in question” (Said, 3).

So What?: Huntington and Said are two very well-known world-renowned scholars. Both authors in their excerpts discuss the Oriental and Orientalism. However, the two authors focus of two different aspects of those the Oriental and Orientalism. Said mainly focus on the academic definition of Orientalism and what it means to be an Orient, “… Orientalism lives on academically through its doctrines and theses about the Orient and the Oriental” (2). Whereas, Huntington captures the more cultural ideals of the Orient and Orientalism, “in this new world the most pervasive, important, and dangerous conflicts will not be between social classes, rich and poor, or other economically defined groups, but between peoples belonging to different cultural entities” (Huntington, 3). Although, Huntington and Said’s vary slightly in their interpretation, it is clear that academic and culture are closely related to the Orient and Orientalism definition.

Personally, I believe that Huntington’s piece is considered an Orientalist discourse, because the author mentions culture and the effects that it has when observing and presenting on the Orient’s culture. In class we talked about how there are different levels of cultures that plays a central role when observing one’s Oriental culture/environment. Huntington thought that, “…because of cultural kinship. “Cultural conflicts,” Vaclav Havel has observed, “are increasing and are more dangerous today than at any time in history,” and Jacques Delors agreed that “future conflicts will be sparked by cultural conflicts rather than economics or ideology.” And the most dangerous cultural conflicts are those along the fault lines between civilizations” (Huntington, 3). On the other hand, I also see how Huntington’s argument is a bit far-fetched and are not relevant to the ethnography discussed in class, because the piece seems to be more focused on the East and West history.

Now What?: One example of a discourse of an “othering” for my community partner for young moms in Marin is portrayed a lot through social media. Social media, such as MTV popular reality show Teen Mom, is always stereotyping young teen moms as trouble makers, uneducated, poor, irresponsible, less capable of providing for their children, careless, and reckless. For several of the moms in the group, these stereotypes did/do apply to their life. For example, some of the moms in the group were trouble makers, irresponsible, uneducated, less capable, careless, and low-income, but it is important to note that not every single mom in the group fell into those categories. As of today, many of the moms have challenged and pushed themselves to redefine what it means to be a young mom to dissociate with the negative discourse about being teen mothers. The mothers with help from individuals have found resources and support groups that have helped them through the roughest of times in their life’s. This goes to prove that just because some of the stereotypes applies to a few teen moms out in the world, it does not necessarily mean that every single teen mother out in the world falls under those labels.

I always wonder why it is so easy for people to judge these young moms so fast, and what qualifies those same people to be making those judgements and categorizing the moms. I believe that by having these stereotypes of what a teen or young mom should look or be like is detrimental to our society. Continuing to labeling the moms as trouble makers, uneducated, and poor is not helping how they are perceived in our society, change their occupation as a mother, nor does it improve the young mom’s self-esteem to change the discourse of who they are.