This collection of eleven original essays re-evaluates Edward Said’s definition of ‘oreintalism’ widely misconstrued as being merely postcolonial and contestable. The volume emphasizes the need to move beyond the prejudice and stereotyping tied to the context of colonial exploitation. It challenges the assumption that oriental studies only served to segregate cultures and undermine the oriental peoples’ capacity for self-formation. This book shows how cultures can generate studies of themselves on their own and that the impetus for such work was clearly noticeable at least in Indian cultural scholarship during the colonial period. The contributors bring to light the orientals’ ordering of themselves and expose the fallacy that western imperialist discourse defined and described us. In the process, they draw upon Said’s distinction between ‘oriental studies’ and ‘orientalism’. Overall, this volume is a plea for reading Said all over again. It shows how best this can be done by offering a variety of readings of texts and events of our cultural past, either in dialogue with the west or just being themselves in their oriental locations. Either way, it calls for a reorientation. Its successful effort in that direction makes this volume of considerable interest and significance to students and scholars of literature, history, sociology and culture studies.
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