Sherif Hossam Ahmed

SID: 900182897

Sociology 3104.01
Midterm Examination

1. What are the various definitions of Orientalism as found in Edward Said’s

text? Why are the East and its people incapable of representing themselves
according to the orientalist frame of mind? How does Edward Said
incorporate Foucault's discourse analysis in his exploration of Orientalism?

- Edward Said was a Palestinian scholar who wrote “Orientalism” which examines

the Western construction and representation of the East, particularly the Middle East,

as an exotic, backward, and inferior "Other." Said provides several definitions and

aspects of Orientalism throughout his text, however, before getting to that it is worth

noting how Said might of came to formulate these definitions and ideas in such an

organized manner. A considerable majority of westerns subconsciously think

‘terrorist’ when they hear the word ‘Arab’ or ‘Muslim’, now to understand why that

is one must observe the societal factors that influence such thinking, firstly, school

systems in countries such as the UK and the US are riddled with corruption and

misrepresentation in the sense that they refrain from covering their colonial history

with oppressed Eastern countries, they do however focus on events such as 9/11

therefore instilling, from a young age, a mental framework that acknowledges

western countries as eternal victims of savagery derived from the middle east and that

any action a government takes towards these allegedly ‘backwards’ countries, no

matter how brutal or inhumane, is valid and merely an act of defense. This is shown

in Bill Ashcroft and Pal Ahluwalia’s analysis on Edward Said (2009, p. 55), they look

at the idea of ‘academic orientalism’; “As an academic discipline, Orientalism

1
Sherif Hossam Ahmed
SID: 900182897
emerged in the late eighteenth century and has since assembled an archive of

knowledge that has served to perpetuate and reinforce Western representations.” Said

critiques the academic discipline of Orientalism, which emerged, as mentioned, in

Europe during the colonial period. He argues that Orientalist scholars have actively

produced knowledge about the East that was inherently biased and served the

interests of Western imperialism which ultimately led to a development in

misrepresentation within not only the academic sphere but has been woven in to the

very fabric of western culture, which leads us to Said’s next definition of Orientalism

which focuses on cultural representation in the form of western literature, art, and

media.

In the opening introduction of Said’s book he tries to structurally break down the

various explanations and causes of the popular perception of the orient, aside from

academia, he goes on to say; “Orientalism is a style of thought based upon an

ontological and epistemological distinction made between "the Orient" and (most of

the time) "the Occident." Thus a very large mass of writers, among whom are poets,

novelists, philosophers. political theorists, economists, and imperial administrators,

have accepted the basic distinction between East and West as the starting point for

elaborate theories, epics, novels, social, descriptions, and political accounts

concerning the Orient, its people, customs, "mind," destiny, and so on.” (Said, 1978,

p. 3) Said deems this ‘a more general meaning for Orientalism’ and is a display of

just how widespread the issue has become being that it has seeped in to

entertainment, academia, and even politics. It can be argued that in today’s age the

manner in which the West represents the East in mainstream media is by far the most

2
Sherif Hossam Ahmed
SID: 900182897
problematic aspect of cultural representation, as this comes in the form of

entertainment (films and TV) as well as international news outlets that have immense

influence on the world population, this from of knowledge consumption is

considerably easier to digest than that of what is found in academia which

consequently distorts people’s perception on a wider scale. The blatant depiction of

the middle eastern people as inferior savages in Hollywood further perpetuates

stereotypes and reinforces power dynamics between the West and the East.

With firmly established power dynamics comes heavy political and military control,

Orientalism as a political tool is used by Western governments to justify colonial

domination over Eastern societies. As I previously mentioned, Orientalist discourse

has portrayed the East as inherently irrational and tyrannical which is why the

political jargon typically used implies that the East and its people are seen as

incapable of representing themselves and in need of Western intervention in the name

of guidance and democracy. This all aligns with what Said was stressing in his work

when he says: “Orientalism as a Western style for dominating, restructuring, and

having authority over the Orient. I have found it useful here to employ Michel

Foucault's notion of a discourse, as described by him in The Archaeology of

Knowledge and in Discipline and Punish, to identify Orientalism.” (Said, 1978, p. 4)

Said is saying that Orientalism functions on the foundation of Western superiority and

authority, in turn, Western policymakers manipulatively position themselves as the

authoritative handlers of Eastern cultures and histories, while dismissing the

perspectives of native voices creating a harsh power imbalance. Said is also saying

that he analyzed Orientalism through a Foucauldian lens, specifically, Foucault's

3
Sherif Hossam Ahmed
SID: 900182897
concept of discourse which highlights how certain ways of speaking and thinking

have the ability to produce power within society, shaping our understanding of the

world. Said applied this by observing how the tampering and controlling of

knowledge regarding the East maintains Western dominance by normalizing colonial

attitudes and policies.

2. How does Foucault analyze power? What distinguishes his ‘power analytics’
from the work of previous theorists?

 The French philosopher and sociologist Michel Foucault showed a great interest

and fascination with the theme of power, what is it? How is it obtained? Where is

it observed? All questions that Foucault and many other theorists have tackled but

none quite like Foucault. In his work he often suggests that power and knowledge

are interlinked and not separate, rather true power is the use of and forming of

knowledge. Before I get in to his method of analysis I would like share what he

believes to be the ‘result’, if you will, of what power actually does after having

obtained it, he says: “technologies of power, which determine the conduct of

individuals and submit them to certain ends or domination, an objectivizing of the

subject” (Foucault, 1988, p. 18) he explains it as utter control over an individual

in whichever way, setting, attitude, and knowledge all factor in to deciding who is

in power and who is in control. Foucault begins to analyze power by, firstly,

emphasizing that power is the distribution and/or limitation of knowledge and,

secondly, carefully observing different variations of power.

4
Sherif Hossam Ahmed
SID: 900182897

Now why does power rely so heavily on knowledge according to Foucault? The

answer is that knowledge has the ability to change and produce both on the

individual level and the societal level so when someone controls what knowledge

is accessible to who then they are in a sense creating ‘truth’, and when this

becomes an accepted truth, then this ultimately dictates what is and isn’t a social

norm, whether it be an action, a word, a look, or a certain behavior, it is all

produced and influenced from knowledge of the accepted truth.

Foucault describes a few different types of power, one of the most notable ones

being; Disciplinary Power, which can be defined as control over a subject through

methods other than force or threat of violence such as creating regular instances

of tests and instilling various forms of surveillance, by doing this the subject

develops a sense of fear from being watched and fear from being perceived as an

outsider in their community or institution. Such real life examples can be

observed in our everyday life when looking at schools and prison, which are

eerily similar in a lot of ways, the idea of taking permission, walking in lines, all

wearing the same clothes, eating the same food, and having no say in the daily

schedule are all clear examples of what Foucault meant by disciplinary power. A

good deal of his work was conducted in such institutions as well as mental

asylums/hospitals as he felt they clearly show power dynamics.

It is important to note that Foucault has an extensive historical background and he

uses history as a lens from which he can examine power within the context of

historical thought, rather than seeking out universal theories of power, he

5
Sherif Hossam Ahmed
SID: 900182897
investigates power relations throughout history drawing example from figures

such as Socrates and Napoleon to prove his theories. His overall approach to

analyzing power is vastly different to the likes of Karl Marx, in the sense that

Marx focused heavily on just how much oppression was prevalent in this whole

idea of a human having power over another human which he wholeheartedly

condemned , Foucault on the other hand is quoted as saying: “We must cease

once and for all to describe the effects of power in negative terms: it ‘excludes’, it

‘represses’, it ‘censors’, it ‘abstracts’, it ‘masks’, it ‘conceals’. In fact power

produces; it produces reality; it produces domains of objects and rituals of truth.

The individual and the knowledge that may be gained of him belong to this

production” (Foucault, 1975). Here one can see just how different Foucault’s

theoretical framework is different from Marxist ideology in the call to refrain

from associating power with such negative attributes. Another major difference in

Foucault’s “power analytics” compared to many previous theorists is that

Foucault moves away from the typical discussion of sovereign power held by

monarchs and states, opting to cover issues of disciplinary mechanisms and

‘governmentality’. All in all Foucault has built a solid body of work consisting of

lectures, interviews, and books that take a thoughtful and in depth look at the

many instances of power in our day to day life.

6
Sherif Hossam Ahmed
SID: 900182897
References:

1. Ashcroft, B., & Ahluwalia, P. (2008). Edward Said (2nd ed.). Routledge.

https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203888070

2. Foucault, M (1975). Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings

1972-1977.

3. Foucault, M. (1988). Technologies of the Self. In L. H. Martin, H. Gutman, & P.

H. Hutton (Eds.), Technologies of the Self: A Seminar with Michel Foucault (pp.

16-30).

4. Foucault, M (1982) Interview: Truth, Power, Self, pp. 9 -15

5. Foucault, M (1976) Excerpt from Society must be Defended, pp. 23-42

6. Said, E. W. (2003). Orientalism. Penguin Classics.