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The Social Psychology of Anti-Iranology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

William G. Millward
William G. Millward*
Affiliation:
American University in Cairo
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Extract

Assuming that every student of the Middle East ought to be at least passingly concerned with the attitudes of Middle Easterners towards him, the group he represents, and the results of their collective academic endeavors, the recent efflorescence of interest in Western “Orientalism” on the part of Iranian scholars and writers deserves the attention of all serious students of Middle Eastern culture and society. Insofar as this interest may be construed as an attempt to set the historical record straight by providing an eastern corrective to West-centered interpretations of Middle Eastern history, it may also be considered a natural and logical consequence of the changing nature of international political and social conditions, particularly as these have obtained since World War II. In this sense it can only be welcomed and applauded in the community of scholars at large.

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 8 , Issue 1-2 , Spring Winter 1975 , pp. 48 - 69
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1975

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References

Notes

1. Hamid Enayat, “The Politics of Iranology,” Iranian Studies, Vol. VI, No. 1 (Winter, 1973), pp. 2-20; an Englished version of the Persian original, “Siyāsat-i Īrānshināsī,” Rāhnemā-yi Ketāb, Vol. 15, Nos. 7-9 (Mehr-Azar 1351), pp. 538-549. Some other contributions to this trend are: Reza Baraheni, “Īn Bidᶜat-i Zisht — Sharqshināsī,” Kayhān, 24 Tīr, 1350 (No. 8398), pp. 6, 16; “Sharqshināsī — Chihrah-yi Dīgarī az Istiᶜmār,” Kayhān, 14 Mordad, 1350 (No. 8416), pp. 6, 19; Daryoosh Ashoori, “Īrānshināsī Chīst?”, Rāhnemā-yi Ketāb, Vol. 14, Nos. 4-6 (Tīr-Shahrīvar 1350), pp. 218- 226 and Nos. 9-12 (Azar-Isfand 1350), pp. 742-747; for further examples of the genre see footnote 5 (p. 18) of the first article cited above.

2. A recent study of two segments of the field of Orientalism as applied to the Arab world is at least free from rancor and tendentiousness. See, Tibawi, A. L., English-Speaking Orientalists; A Critique of Their Approach to Islam and Arab Nationalism (Geneva: Islamic Center, 1965)Google Scholar. In another recent, three-volume study of the Orientalists, an Arab writer devotes only 13 out of some 1166 pages to the question of the value of their studies, and then only in the form of short quotations from earlier Arab writers. See, alᶜAqiqi, Najib, al-Mustashriqūn (Cairo: Dār al-Maᶜārif, 1964), Vol. 3, pp. 1151–1164Google Scholar. Whatever one may think about Muhammad al-Bahi's al-Fikr al-Islāmī al-Ḥadīth wa Silatuh Bil-Istiᶜmār al-Gharbī, the appendices to the fifth edition of the book (Beirut: Dar al-Fikr, 1970 pp. 519-77) are replete with errors and insults toward the Orientalists and generally not up to the standard he tried to achieve for the body of his text.

3. The following articles by prominent Arab scholars provide a striking contrast in both attitude and tone to most of the articles cited above in footnote 1. Mahmud al-Ghul, “Al-Mustashriqu aqallu dirāyatan bi-asrāri al-lughati al-ᶜarabiyyati,” al-ᶜArabī, Number 4 (Shaᶜban 1378 - March, 1959), pp. 118-122; Salah al-Din al-Munajjid, “Mes experiences intellectuelles,” Conference donnee au Cenacle Libanais, le 28 mai 1962, et publiee en arabe dans la serie des conferences due Cenacle. (French extract, pp. 32-33); Salah Abd al-Sabur, “Matā nataḥarraru min ᶜuqdati al-ḍuᶜfi?”, al-Ahrām, 5 November, 1965.

4. For a sampling of Kermani's hostile views and the uncompromising language he used to express them, see, Feridoon Adamiyat, Andīsheh-hā-yi Āghā Khān Kermānī (Tehran: Tahoori Library, 1346/1967), pp. 178-82; on Akhundzadeh, see also, Feridoon Adamiyat, Andīsheh-hāyi Mīrzā Fathᶜalī Ākhūndzādeh [Life and Thought of Mirza Fathali Akhundzādeh, 1812-1878; a contribution to the history of the (sic) Iranian liberal ideas], (Tehran: Khwarazmi Publications, 1349/1970), pp. 123-126. It is also worth remembering that the man whom some critics, Eastern and Western, have acclaimed as Iran's greatest modern writer, Sadeq Hedayat, made no attempt to hide his anti-Arab feelings. See, Kamshad, Hassan, Modern Persian Prose Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1966), pp. 148, 159Google Scholar.

5. Hamid Enayat, op. cit., pp. 12-13.

6. See his most recent contribution, a massive four-volume study (in seven parts) entitled En Islam iranien: Aspects spirituels et philosophiques (Paris: Editions Gallimard - nrf - 1971).

7. Rāhnemā-yi Ketāb, Vol. 12, Nos. 1-2 (Farvardīn-Ordībihisht, 1348), p. 35.

8. A tentative beginning to this study has been made by such books as Southern, R. W., Western Views of Islam in the Middle Ages (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1962)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, two well-known books by N. Daniel, and for the Russian school, V. V. Bartold, Istoria izoocheinia vostoka u yevrope ie rossi: Farsi translation by Hamzeh Sardadvar, Khāvarshināsī dar Rūssīyah va Urūpā (Tehran: Ibn-i Sina, 1351/1972). Also important in this regard is the study by J.-J. Waardenburg, L'Islam dans le Miroir de 1'Occident (Paris-La Haye: Mouton & Co., 1963).

9. Use and Abuse of History (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955)Google Scholar; Debates With Historians (New York: Meridian Books, 1958)Google Scholar.

10. The Poverty of Historicism (Boston: Beacon Press, 1957)Google Scholar.

11. In Cairo University, for example, two doctoral theses are currently being prepared in the Department of Arabic literature, one by an Egyptian, and the other by a. French monk, assessing the contributions of the English and French Orientalists, respectively, to the study and revival of Arabic literature in modern times. Similar studies are desirable for the German, Italian, and Russian contributions.

12. A fairly satisfactory view of the Iranian religious experience can be had by reference to the works of scholars like Bausani, Corbin, Masse and Zaehner, and to the English writings of S. H. Nasr. Professor Pope's Survey of Persian Art should also be recalled in this connection.

13. Diogenes, No. 49 (Spring, 1965), p. 136.

14. “Sharqshināsī va Jahān-i Imrūz,” ᶜUlūm-i Ijtimāᶜī, V Vol. 1, No. 2, pp. 52-53.

15. A recent egregious example of this procedure, and the justifiable resentments it creates, can be found in Muhammad Anis, Faḓīḥatu wātha'iqin ᶜālamiyyatu, al-Ahrām, 5 October, 1973, p. 5.

16. Basile Nikitine, “Farangshināsī, ou 1'Europe vue de Teheran,” in Charesteria Orientalia, ed. Felix Tauer, Vera Kubickova and Ivan Hrbek (Prague, 1956), pp. 210-211.

17. Abu al-Hasan Jalili, op. cit., p. 55.

18. Javad Mujabi, “Dukkān-i ᶜIrfān Forūshī rā Bibandid,” Iṭṭilā'āt 3 Khordad 1352 (No. 14107), p. 17.