Defending the West: A Critique of Edward Said’s Orientalism

When the Courtauld Institute in London announced that they would be holding a
conference in April 2008 entitled ‘Framing the Other: 30 Years After Orientalism,’
we were once again reminded of the central role Edward Said plays in Western
public discourse. The Courtauld’s decision to use Orientalism as their point of
departure in studying Western perceptions of the ‘Other’ comes at an interesting
time as a number of scholars are developing a new body of literature that is highly
critical of Said’s landmark work. The most recent additions to this literature are Ibn
Warraq’s Defending the West: A Critique of Edward Said’s Orientalism and Daniel
Martin Varisco’s Reading Orientalism: Said and the Unsaid.

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