Foucault held that all knowledge is a product of discourse bound up with power.

Evidence

This third definition connects knowledge about the Orient to power over the Orient. Said draws on the insights of Michel Foucault, a French philosopher and historian, to develop this connection between knowledge and power. Foucault rejected the Enlightenment’s confidence in the capacity of human reason to attain objective knowledge and truth. He did not believe there was any such thing as knowledge for knowledge’s sake, nor did he accept that the quest for knowledge is a disinterested enterprise. What we hold to be true is instead a product of a particular discourse. — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 204

Categorization

• DEFINE: Explains the Foucauldian notion of discourse that underlies Said’s third definition of Orientalism.