American Oriental studies were founded to emulate European imperial frameworks

Evidence

While it is true to say that the United States did not in fact become a world empire until the twentieth century, it is also true that during the nineteenth century the United States was concerned with the Orient in ways that prepared for its later, overtly imperial concern. Leaving aside the campaigns against the Barbary pirates in 1801 and 1815, let us consider the founding of the American Oriental Society in 1842. At its first annual meeting in 1843 its president, John Pickering, made the very clear point that America proposed for itself the study of the Orient in order to follow the example of the imperial European powers. Pickering’s message was that the framework of Oriental studies—then as now—was political, not simply scholarly. — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 745

Categorization

• XREF: Grounds the claim that scholarship’s political underpinnings predate US empire—useful for later readings on how academic knowledge production enables exclusion. — connects to: Oriental studies were reconceived as instruments of national policy toward postcolonial nations; European Orientalism was normalized into a coherent US scholarly consensus; Orientalism evolved from personal observation into institutional and governmental management — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 501 (+6 more)
• corroborated: 3 independent passages support this claim — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 745

Broader Connections

• US Middle East research institutions retained the European Orientalist outlook #expands (0.90) — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 748
• European Orientalism was normalized into a coherent US scholarly consensus #expands (0.85)
• Orientalist knowledge served to deepen European suzerainty over Asia #expands (0.85)
• US post-war hegemony repurposed Orientalism and modernization theory to justify empire. #expands (0.85) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 28
• American missionary institutions reproduced the imperial character of European counterparts #exemplifies (0.80)
• Orientalism evolved from personal observation into institutional and governmental management #qualifies (0.75) — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 501