Week Five: After Orientalism

Post date: Sep 28, 2016 8:57:56 PM

Presentation Slides

“Good Muslim, Bad Muslim”

• 1. What is the context of our shared history with the Middle East?

  2. How does Western representation of that history serve Western narratives?

“Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving?”

• 1. How does Western treatment of Muslim women reflect on the West’s treatment of its own women?

  2. Discuss how the veil may or may not play into Orientalist views of the “hidden Orient”.

“An Anthropologist’s Introduction”

• 1. Discuss the author’s view on the “outside” Islam vs the “inside” Islam.

  2. How does class play into Gilsenan’s historical narrative/critique of other historical narratives of the Middle East?

Discussion Questions- Overall

• 1. Why do we feel the need to divide Islamic culture by geopolitical boundaries?

  2. When/why did Islam become politicized?

  3. Why were women used as a tactic to elicit Western sympathies for our intervention in the Middle East?