Abstract
Edward Said taught readers of French and English scholarship and literature to appreciate numerous assumptions about the East they had previously made unthinkingly. Said's notorious neglect of German Orientalism—as insufficiently determined by colonialism—has unintentionally fertilised research in this area too. Marchand deals with scholarly debates at an often quite technical level; Wokoeck looks at academic institutions and careers. Theology is central to both volumes, as is the now undeniable fact that Germany produced an influential Orientalist tradition with very little inspiration from colonial politics. In this way Said's ‘knowledge = power’ equation is played down (e.g. Marchand, p. 19). Marchand tells a chronological story, starting from the universalising horizons of Romanticism and the dominance of early nineteenth-century Philhellenism. In the mid-century period, a philological spirit overcame Oriental studies, to be followed by the ‘Second Oriental Renaissance’ dominated by giants such as Theodor Nöldeke and Julius Wellhausen, who cultivated Arabic and Islamic studies alongside the better-established studies of the Old Testament and ancient Near East. At the century's turn, Orientalism was increasingly asserting itself in what Marchand calls a ‘furor Orientalis’. The New Testament now achieved its own contextualisation against a background of Judaism and Oriental religions—the origin of an important strand in late antique studies. Racist theories on Aryans and Semites proliferated, along with contemporary imperial and colonial issues. Study of art became acceptable, museums increased in number and size, travel became more common, and Orientalists engaged with native intellectuals. An epilogue touches on Weimar, Nazism and the feeble contribution of Oriental studies to post-war multicultural thinking.
Published Version
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