Said’s article and reminder to post on Sakuntala

Hi everyone,

I’ve uploaded the article I showed in class, Edward Said’s “Orientalism Revisited,” to the Readings page. It’s not an easy read, and requires some knowledge of the debates surrounding Said’s publication of Orientalism, but there’s still some valuable material here: I would suggest you focus mostly on pages 92-95 where he discusses how the Orient became Europe’s “silent Other” starting roughly the end of the 18th century (note that this is when many of the 1001 Nights translations came out!). I hope this article is useful for those of you writing on 1001 Nights.

Then, I would like to remind those who haven’t sent in their proposal to do so asap. I would like to know what you plan to work on (even if you’re not entirely sure yet), so that I know you’re going in the right direction and so that I can form groups working on roughly the same topic (for peer review later).

Also, I realized that because the proposal was due, many of you forgot to publish your online work for this week, which was on the concepts of rasa, dharma, or kama in Sakuntala. This can be a short post in which you give more information on one of these concepts (they’re quite complex and elusive, I know) and link it to a few lines from the play. Please try to post before class on Tuesday, and don’t forget to check the schedule on our site for readings (for Tuesday, we’re reading the rest of Sakuntala so we can discuss in class).

Have a good weekend everyone, and let me know if you get stuck with your close reading essay,

Anke