Orientalism’s practitioners deny their complicity with state power

Evidence

It is therefore not surprising that the field of Islamic and Arabic Orientalism, always ready to deny its complicity with state power, had never until very recently produced an internal critique of the affiliations I have just been describing, and that Lewis can utter the amazing statement that a criticism of Orientalism would be “meaningless.” — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 866

Categorization

• XREF: Connects directly to the Islamophobia readings this module scaffolds — the denial-of-complicity pattern recurs in Islamophobia scholarship. — connects to: The nationalist ideology refuses to critique the state it helped design. — Neil DeVotta, Sinhalese Buddhist Nationalist…, 229; The orientalist opposed Westernization despite being funded by his own government; Orientalism’s authority over its subject derives from power, not disinterested objectivity. (+2 more)
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 866
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: The nationalist ideology refuses to critique the state it helped design. — Neil DeVotta, Sinhalese Buddhist Nationalist…, 229; The orientalist opposed Westernization despite being funded by his own government; Orientalism’s authority over its subject derives from power, not disinterested objectivity. (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Orientalism’s power lies in its practitioners’ ignorance of what they are doing. #corroborates (0.93) — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 206
• Orientalism criticism became a politicized ad hominem charge, not an epistemic critique #complicates (0.74) — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 136