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Muslim Racialised Tropes: “Orientalism”, Past and Present

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The Political Appropriation of the Muslim Body

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Abstract

This chapter examines Edward Said’s “Orientalism” thesis where the West’s historical representation of Muslim men and women, he argues, constitutes a racist ideology of Eastern people which has enabled Empire, a discourse which today feeds counter-terror law, foreign policy and political and public discourse. Said’s gender omissions are infilled through the author’s research of images of “oriental”, predominantly Muslim, women as “passive” or “sexualised,” redolent in early feminist tracts, anthropology, Western “art” and photography. The contiguity of these tropes in the present demonstrates the enduring relevance of Said’s scholarship. Post 9/11 witnesses a shift from the “saving” Muslim women rhetoric as justification for territorial incursion, to punishment. This mode surfaces in the portrayal of Shamima Begum, the “docile” terrorist and bête noire of the Wests’ retributive zeal.

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    Susan S. M. Edwards

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Edwards, S.S.M. (2021). Muslim Racialised Tropes: “Orientalism”, Past and Present. In: The Political Appropriation of the Muslim Body. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68896-7_2

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