Orientalism and Post-Colonial Theory :: Essays Papers

Orientalism and Post-Colonial Theory Fitting Saids vision of Orientalism into erect colonial theory is a fluid meeting of social discourse. As post colonial theory demands a constant redefinition of both politics and culture in a rapidly globalizing world, Said also misgivings how cultural power and countenance determines modern identity (Nealon and Giroux, 149). Saids dialogue of Oritentalism demands a new look at history and the colonial processes imprinted upon so many peoples. It opens and engages discourses of racism and socio-economic inequality, and in and of itself asks how post-colonial theory translates into our lives today. Recasting human identity using new conceptions of historical and modern communities of us Europeans against those non-Europeans, Said challenges European versions of history and authority of knowledge (Said, 7). The interestingness of a more complete understanding of how our world and the other are connected requires a challenge to the referentia l power of European historical texts and its exteriority to what it describes (Said, 20). rich analysis of postcolonial relations is necessary within all bodies of academic thought (Nealon and Giroux, 142), Said contends even the study of English literature is rooted in colonial purposes of assimilation and control (Said, 145). How we conceptualize ourselves extends beyond scholarly print to other modes of experience and the everyday assumptions of our culture about the other. If politics and culture work in collusion (Nealon and Giroux, 142), it is in this interface that social identity finds root and means for change. Post colonial theory realizes the socio-economic inequality of nations and peoples as consequence of colonial systems, and attends to the question of how cultures maintain autonomy when modern media and military forces divide world in ways astoundingly similar to the era of colonialism (Nealon and Giroux150).