Orientalist discourse simultaneously homogenizes and divides its subjects
Evidence
As Lisa Lowe (1991) reminds us in her work on British and French Orientalism, this was a process of homogenization that was both constantly dividing and enumerated through scientiļ¬c and rationalist discourses. Orientalism simultaneously homogenizes and divides; it represents a discursive formation that organizes race, class, and gender into a historical project. ā Junaid Rana, Terrifying Muslims, 286
Categorization
- DEFINE: Articulates the core paradox of Orientalism as discursive formation: it flattens diversity while insisting on fine-grained enumeration and division.
- DEEPTHINKING: The homogenize-and-divide simultaneity is a genuinely dense, reusable analytic ā it explains how classification systems function as power technologies, not just in Orientalism but across racial/colonial knowledge production generally.
- XREF: connects to: Orientalismās totalizing discourse critique erases all sites of resistance and liberation; Orientalism and Third World Literature are complementary homogenizing gestures served by ethnic intellectuals ā Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Classes, Nations, Literatures, 824