Edward Said

Edward Said (deceased) was "professor of English and comparative literature and chair of the Doctoral Program in Comparative Literature at Columbia University. He is largely recognized for his 1978 book, Orientalism, in which he addresses the development of ideas and images about the Arab world in Western European cultures and has worked toward promoting the consideration of Third World literature as a major cultural force within the Western world. Other books Said has written include The World, the Text, and the Critic (1983), Culture and Imperialism (1993) and The Politics of Dispossession: The Struggle for Palestinian Self-Determination (1994), and aside from writing a music column for The Nation, he has published numerous articles in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, New Statesman and London Observer.

"Said is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a former member of the Executive Board of the New York Council of the Humanities. From 1980-1983, he was chairman of the board of directors of the Institute of Arab Studies and from 1977-1991, he served as a member of the Palestine National Council, which is the parliament in exile of the Palestinian people. He received the Rene Wellek Award given by the American Comparative Literature Association in 1984-1985.

"Said was born in Jerusalem and received his B.A. from Princeton and his M.A. and doctorate from Harvard, where he won the Bowdoin Prize. He has served as a visiting professor at Yale, Harvard and Johns Hopkins."


 * National Advisory Board, American Committee on Jerusalem
 * Advisory Board (2002), Center for the Global South
 * Supporter, International Committee for Transition to Democracy in Iran

Criticism of Orientalism

 * Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Nations, Classes, Literatures (Verso, 2008).

Related Sourcewatch articles

 * Kanan Makiya
 * Ella Shohat
 * Barenboim-Said Foundation
 * Saree Makdisi - cousin