Culture and Dignity Dialogues Between the Middle East and the West [Paperback]

• Outlines an anthropology for the 21st century that focuses on the myriad connections between peoples—especially the critical intercultural dialogues between the cultures of the East and the West
• Takes an historical and ethnographic approach to studying the intermingling of Arab peoples and the West.
• Demonstrates how cultural exchange between the East and West is a two-way process
• Presents an anthropological perspective on issues such as religious fundamentalism, the lives of women and children, notions of violence and order

Preface xii

1 Introduction 1

Indignities 5

Naturalizing Difference and the Great Transformation 14

Comparison, Ethnography, and History 17

2 From Rifaah al-Tahtawi to Edward Said: Lessons in Culture and Dignity 24

Introduction 24

Rifaah al-Tahtawi and France 26

A Hundred Years Later: Edward Said 34

Concluding Comments 45

3 Ethnography as Theory: On the Roots of Controversy in Anthropology 51

Introduction 51

Unstated Consensus 54

Defining Ethnographic Worth: 1896–2000 55

Ethnographic Audiences 64

An Outsider Looking In on Anthropology’s Ethnography 69

Concluding Comments 74

4 Orientalism, Occidentalism, and the ControlC»