Orientalism

The marvel that is known as Orientalism is but one position of Western misrepresentations of the Middle East. Most Arabs in Western countries will agree that the largest amount of indistinct information about Arabs come from the media, newspapers, magazines, or form television. When used by an Arab, the word Orientalist generally refers to a western scholar who studies the Middle East. Edward Said a very intellectual Arab Christian Scholar describes the western views on the Middle-Eastern people. In his book Orientalism he describes Orientalism as:

“By Orientalism I mean several things, all of them, in my opinion, interdependent. The most readily accepted designation of for Orientalism is an academic one, and indeed, and indeed the label still serves in a number of academic institutions. 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, 1992: 2).

He also states:

To speak of Orientalism therefore is to speak mainly, although not exclusively, of a British and French Cultural enterprise, a project whose dimensions take in such disparate realms as the imagination itself, the whole of India and the Levant, the Biblical texts and the Biblical lands, the spice trade, colonial armies and a long tradition of colonial administrators, a formidable scholarly corpus, innumerable Oriental “experts” and “hands,” an Oriental professoriate, a complex array of oriental ideas, many eastern sects, philosophies, and wisdom domesticated for local European use- the list can be extended more or less indefinitely, (Said 4).

Once a genuine seeker of the truth is attentive of the long-standing quarrel and resentment between Arabs and the West and learns not to trust everything, which they see in print, valid knowledge can be obtained rapidly. There are some Western writers what aren't biased against Arabs. There are even non-Arabs who portray the Middle East in a positive light. It should also be noted that even some modern books on the Middle-East by Arab authors, suffer form inadequacy due to lack of knowledge, unorthodox ideas and depending on Non-Arab sources.

Edward Said accurately referred to Orientalism as a cultural enterprise. This is no misrepresentation, since the study of the Oriental east by the West was often motivated and often co-operated with the majestic aims of the European powers. When Europe began a campaign to settle and defeat the rest of the world for their benefit, they sent their educators and missionary resources to tolerate in order to help in the task. Orientalists were not the servants of an imperialist government who was using their services as a way to weaken an enemy very cleverly:

With Regard to Islam and the Islamic territories, for example, Britain felt that it had legitimate interests, as a Christian power, to safeguard (Majid, 67). A complex apparatus for tending these interests developed. Such early organizations as the Society of Promoting Christian Knowledge (1698) and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel ...