Insidehigered.com has an interview today with Robert Irwin:
Q: You note that the initial scholarly reception for Orientalism was quite critical. But the book went on to have considerable influence. How do you account for that?
A: The earliest reviewers were mostly people who knew a lot about the actual state of the field. The enthusiasts who came later did not know the field and were mostly too lazy to check Said’s assertions. The book, by “speaking truth to power,” appeals to the adversarial mentality so common among students and radical lecturers.
Bashing Orientalism has seemed to be a natural intellectual accessory to opposing Israeli policies on the West Bank and Gaza Strip, American imperialism and British racism. It is much easier deliver patronizing lectures or essays about old-fashioned Orientalists than it is to actually do anything useful for Palestine (or come to that actually learn Arabic and become the “right” kind of Orientalist, whatever that would be). Also, for many students, Said’s book, with its references to Foucault, Gramsci and Althusser, must have provided them with their first brush with critical theory. Exciting stuff.
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