(Rerelease) SOC211 – "It Ain't a Rug!": Edward Said's Orientalism

Hey there everyone, it's Ellen again, and this week we bring you another classic from our back catalog, an episode about Edward Saeed, a very important theorist here in the world of sociology as well as other fields, of course, and his concept of Orientalism. So this episode comes from our spring 2019 season, so it's a little bit dated, but it is still relevant and something that you, if you're a grad student in sociology, or maybe just a student in a social theory course, something that you will run into for sure. And I think in this current day and age, we're very aware of perspectives and standpoints and making sure that we're reflexive in all of those items. This topic right here is an important one. So take a listen, learn a little bit, be sure to stay social, think social, and go read a book, specifically Edward Saeed's Orientalism. Hello and welcome to the social breakdown, the podcast where we break down our complex world, one topic at a time using our sociological imagination. We are your hosts, Penn, Omar, and Ellen. And today's topic is Orientalism, and the scholar who helped solidify the concept Dr. Edward Saeed. So this is, in my book, a tough topic because I struggle with understanding kind of the complexities of Orientalism. But it's also Saeed, like he's like a different level of scholar. Well, I mean, he's thinking up in the atmosphere. Yeah, exactly. And I'm down, like maybe we're like little earthworms, third story building. I'm an earthworm. In this episode, we're going to work together and try and make sense of this super important book if you're in cultural studies and sociology in any, I think even in philosophy and ethnic studies courses. Even history. Yeah, you're probably at least going to hear his name if not have to read an excerpt or the entire button. So we're going to work together through it. But first, what the heck is Orientalism? So I have a few things that we should not confuse Orientalism with. It's not top ramen. It ain't top ramen. It ain't a rug. It's not Aladdin. It's not an out-of-date descriptor of what Penn and I look like. Well, that phrase does exist as that Orientalism, from Edward Saye's perspective, right? Exactly. So don't think that when we say Oriental or Orientalism, we're talking about a Chinese food takeout place. Instead, what we're talking about is a process. So Edward Saye's concept of Orientalism is a process of othering, of comparing us to them, so that people in power, those people who tend to be in charge of the othering process, can continue to have power over and dominate people that they, quote, "other." Okay. That's a little bit complicated and wishy-washy, but we're going to get through it and work through this whole Orientalism and othering process. So why does Saye call it Orientalism rather than othering? Why is his book not called otheringism? Otheringism? I think that's probably why he did a new set phrase. Yeah, because it's not correct. Or if it's like the othering, then it sounds like a horror movie. Oh, yeah. I think there's a horror movie called horror. No? Okay. So the reason why he calls it Orientalism is that Saye situates this entire book and his argument in the context of how the West writes about and treats and thinks about the East. So in this book, and when you're talking about cultural studies and historical studies, it used to be that the West was called the Oxidant and the East was called the Orient. So what he's looking at, what Saye's looking at is how the West has perceived, described, written about the East, right? How the Oxidant has written about the Orient. And it's key to keep in mind that when Saye is talking about the Orient, he's not talking about places where Penn and I and our ancestors come from. He's not talking about our current idea of the East, like China, Japan, Thailand, the Philippines, whatever. He is instead talking about the OG East, the Middle East, okay? So Arab countries, Turkey. So throughout this conversation, when we're talking about the East, think of the Middle East. And that also ties back into your earlier comments about the Orient and Oriental is not in the context that Saye is writing, is not maybe someone from any East Asian country. But this idea that we now understand the East, as also representing those countries, or maybe people from those countries, goes back to everything that we're going to talk about in this episode about what does it mean to otherwise? And who's supposed to be included in the West and who or what is supposed to be included in the East? But like when the word Orientalism in just basic popular usage as in like, oh, the fancy rugs or the things from the East, I still feel like the, so much the attention, but the meaning behind that still refers to how we look at others. Yes, absolutely. So that in that sense, it's parallels to what Saye's talking about in the othering process. It's like the Orient is exotic, it's far away. You know, even if it's very both Asian and Middle East. Yeah, it's different. And it's like all these spices and the intricate rugs and the weird, flutty music or whatever it is, they're still that feel like, oh, it's so exotic and different from us, you know, versus them. Yeah, exactly. And if you look at just the book cover of Edward's book, you have a snake charm. Yes, it's a it's a painting of a snake charmer with some type of leader, community leader who's watching the snake charmer perform on an Oriental right, right? So it's very exotic looking. As Ellen alluded to how Orientalism in this distinction between oxygen, orient, otherizing where the process of othering is not a natural human tendency. It is one that arises due to our social circumstance, the production of culture. And then the time period in the space in which Saye does writing, he's talking about imperialism and the colonialism context. And that regard otherizing is a process of power. And we can rule another person or other people by viewing them as different from us. And as long as they're different, they're also opposite and the traits of let's say A and B, black and white, orient, oxygen are not also ever meant to mix. Yeah. And we can increase this process by seeing their ways. So the other person in this case, the Orient as different and then dangerous. And maybe in this sense needs to be either occupied or taken care of or we need to absorb their resources or we need to make sure that this place is taken care of thus legitimating colonialism and just invasion into people's countries and things like that. So that's really, really, really important with the concept of otherizing. Yeah. Yeah. And we see perfect examples of this happening in our headlines today with Trump's whole thing about building wall and shutting down the government in order to build this wall, right? His whole thinking process through this is an othering process, right? What he's saying is that Mexican people or migrants who are traveling through Mexico to get to America, they are not Americans, right? They do not understand our way of life. They do not follow our laws. They are dangerous. And therefore we need to dominate them and we need to build a wall if we cannot dominate them. We need to build a wall so that they can't even come into our country. And that's the same. If you see throughout history, there's tons of examples of othering leading to really horrific human conditions, right? Slavery, blacks are not white. Therefore they're dangerous to us. In the Cold War, we have Soviets are not believers in democracy. Therefore we need to build up nuclear armaments to fight against them. So the othering process is always about figuring out who is less than you separating them from you and then dominating them through a variety of different processes that Sayid writes about in this book. The ones doing the othering will see themselves as more superior in all the ways. Particularly in terms of value and we are more civilized, we are more humane. We have democracy, we have freedom, we have liberty and equality, all these things and look at all these other savage places. I think Native Americans also are a great example of that. And what we did. And they just need to be squashed or enslaved. That's a really good point, Penn, because at any context, any environment, any historical time period that you're talking about, any type of otherizing process, the people who get to determine or control that otherizing process are already presumed to be at the top of the social hierarchy. So it fits very well into their rhetoric of we need to continue to do these things to maintain our own either self-interest or our own self-position. Because if the scales of life were more balanced, obviously if you give blacks more rights or women more rights or XX people more rights, then that obviously, in their perspective, compromises their position, of course. So we have to do this to maintain the status quo. But there's also that sense of righteousness. - It's our duty to go and spread our ideas and values to civilize the savages. - To civilize the savages, yes. And it's not just something that you see only people from Western societies doing to Eastern societies. I mean, just if you're into Chinese history, you'll know every so, so much about Chinese emperors who say we need to, literally, I mean, Confucianism is all about, quote, civilizing savages of barbarians who are outside of our walls, right? So, even though-- - Or horizontalism. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's not attached to one specific geographic location or, you know, specific race, it's everywhere. And I think this is why Orientalism is, this book by Saeed is such an important text in sociology because it is about domination. And if you're into social theory, especially contemporary theory, that's kind of the main theme throughout all of the text you'll read is domination. - Yeah, trying to understand people who have power and what they do to people with less power. - Absolutely. So, yeah, I think that was a really, really good overview of what Orientalism is. And Orientalism is a concept, again, it's said multiple times that came from Dr. Edward Saeed, from his book Orientalism. And he also had a book, "Dripe Before Orientalism", which was called "Culture and Imperialism". - Yes. - So, reading both of those books together, you can get a really good sense of the perspective and the time period that he's referring to. So, the book Orientalism came out in 1978. There are multiple editions since then. And as we talked about, it dominates a lot of sociological theory. It's right up there with Weber's Protestant ethic, Foucault's discipline and punish, but there's gender trouble. So, just to give a little context of the type of person Edward Saeed is and where he came from. - So, he was born in Palestine in 1935. His father was an American soldier. Thus Saeed was a Palestinian-American. He consequently grew up in various places around the world. He grew up in Jerusalem, Cairo, Massachusetts. And later became a vocal political figure when it came to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He went to undergrad in a guy's MA from Princeton and a guy's PhD from Harvard. And then later, he joined Columbia's English and comparative literature department in 1963 and stayed there until he passed in 2003. So, it's really important to know, especially when you're talking about anyone doing cultural studies, historical analysis or any of these types of work, is that getting an idea of who the author was, you can really get an idea of how and why they came to write the things that they came to write. 'Cause obviously his father being an American soldier. Yeah, his whole world was shaped by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and then obviously the multiple wars that America has been in with the Middle East. So, that's really important to kind of keep those things in mind when thinking about Edward Saeed and Orientalism. Yeah, and if you're wondering why Saeed was teaching in an English comparative literature department, even though he's a social theorist, that's actually where a lot of people tend to go. Critical theorists will go. So, she goes dealing with culture. If you know anything about the English department or super like hybrid theoretical, yes, they're not really English. No, no, no. They're not like, here's what she and Ms. Heaney talked about in his poem. No, no, no, it's like, it's like, how do we talk about talking about writing? You know, it's like four steps removed from the actual thing they're talking about. So, they're very, very much at theoretical field, actually, like hardcore English. So, it's actually, it's not a far-fetched thing that he was in that, you know, in English. They're not, it's not like he's doing experiments or dealing human subjects or crunching numbers like in social science. He's just theorizing about society, reading old texts, looking at history and things like that. So, other departments that might have been fitting would have been like philosophy and topology, but he was at Comparative Live. And actually, Drew the Butler was also in Comparative Literature Department at Berkeley as well. Okay, so let's go back to this idea of Orientalism. Going back to our original discussion that we understand Said's background a little better. Let's talk about some basic definitions and explanation of what Orientalism is for the more through Said's words, right? So, again, Orientalism arises from the word Oriental and it is a relational comparison against the Occident. So, let's answer your East West, but again, East, in this case, is Middle East. The important thing that I remember is that the Orient is only the Orient if you compare it to the West. Like, if you're just there, you're not comparing it to anybody, you're just there, right? It's like, you're only that thing in comparison to other things. So, if there is no West, there's no Occident, you don't have the Orient. So, it's a binary, meaning that there has to have the two sides comparing or playing off one another. Or how you, or, you know, men and women. Yeah, yeah. In fact, there's them. Yeah, and like you can't-- Or just like foreigner and like citizen or whatever. Though these like binaries, how you were saying it's relational or important, because you couldn't understand someone as a foreigner unless they were supposedly in a place out of context. So, you need to understand who is that us part. Yeah. Now, or men and women, or you can't have an underclass without an upper class. You can't have disadvantage without advantage. Otherwise, those terms in and of themselves would make very little sense. You can't have good with that. Or the last thing. Exactly. Good for you, Penn, you got one. So, there's Yin and Yang, yeah. So, but in all these binaries, men and women, Yin and Yang, East and West, there's always going to be a dominant, more powerful side of a binary. That's why it creates conflict. And that's why there's always going to be one side as being kind of squash or more oppressed than the other because it's, again, we're talking about domination. And that domination is not something that is natural or inherent. It is always when we're talking sociologically, a product of social circumstance, right? It's a social construction that West is more powerful than East in a situation. Yeah, exactly. So, it's not like we're saying the West is actually better than the East or men are actually better than women. That's just how society is structured that gives that group more power over the other group. So, that's why there's a pretty clear link between orientalism as a means of imperialism and colonization. Those are both forms of domination in terms of everything, resources, culture, people, bodies, space, all those things, right? So, it's based on the fact that the oxidant or the West wanted to take materials and resources from the Orient, the East, like wanting oil from the Middle East, cheap labor materials from China and Southeast Asia, right? Orientalism legitimizes the domination of the Orient and the exploitation of its resources and people. And there's a really great quote in the book where Said says on page 119 of this edition that I have that says, "The Orient only mattered on what it could do for you," right? And he means that not only in the material and tangible items that the Orient could supply the West, but also the social power, the legitimacy of Western empires that could dominate Eastern countries, right? So, it's not just those tangible things, but also politically. There was a quote in here I wanted to look about something about Europe, but oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Like he says here, "I myself believe that Orientalism is more particularly valuable as a sign of European Atlantic power over the Orient than it is as a verdict discourse about the Orient, which is what in its academic or scholarly form it claims to be," right? So it's more about the power of the West, rather than even about anything about the East, because it's all from the perspective of the West. What page is that? Oh, yes. Introduction page six of this edition that I'm using. So, Omar, do you wanna talk a little bit about how Sayyid talks about scholars and politicians that he labels as Orientalists? Sure, so this is really, really important for Sayyid's analysis, and if someone were to, I guess, coin or classify the type of analysis that he did, it is called a Contra Punto reading. Contra Punto my god that was that word that word it does favorite word really Contra Punto? Conch I remember when she said sorry. I don't know I was like when I first took her class dr. Nandita Sharma here at U.A. She I'm brilliant. She needs about every site and culture theory and stuff But I remember when she said that like well the contra-puntable and I was like what is that word? Where's that word before I don't look it up. I was like what what is it? Is it English? It doesn't sound like it. So a ContraPunto reading or a ContraPunto analysis goes back to what that quote that Penn just said that it's about, the orientalism is about the process of let's say the West's domination over the Orient and not like the Orient in and of itself. So doing a ContraPunto reading or a ContraPunto analysis would be to when you're examining these texts or written documents, particularly maybe primary documents, that were written by the scholars of the time that Said spent a lot of time discussing of people who are going out, so the oxidants going to the Orient space to write about the culture and everything like that, rather than just reading them for face value, you would read them almost in a way of using this sociological imagination, like what does it mean to be a scribe the European Empire and you go to another country and you're talking about let's say the role of the sugar plantation and how that gives you resources for your country. You would want to read these texts as like an open, flowing document that not just talks about these things in a descriptive manner, but actually talks about the role of these things in their context, meaning like how the sugar plantation becomes a place and a site of conflict and how people talk about, you know, the Orients, their mystical and their sexual and barbaric, rather than just assuming that might be true, you would want to read these things in such a way that kind of takes the perspective of the West, takes the perspective of the struggles in the East and kind of see reading between the lines. And that is the type of work that he did to stitch the story in this book together, because if you just read the same text that these imperialists or anyone in his work that he's talking about, you would just read the version of history that is written by the winners, rather than taking in the voices of the struggle, the resistance, and other more complicated histories. So, these texts and ways of thinking are adopted by Western governments, militaries, political agents, and are used by them to exploit the East. So they have a particular way of writing about the East, a particular way of investigating the East, a particular way of seeing the East. So when Western scholarship about the Eastern world is inextricably tied to imperialist societies, who produced it, which makes much orientalist work political, and it serves power. So that's why when you're reading like all these old texts, there is a lot of power that's invested in those particular documents just because of the time period and like the system of society that they were going through. So look at all early texts about the East and you'll find that they were written by men from the West in an orientalist mindset. It would be very similar to how, let's say, men would write about women's bodies throughout history, or how powerful elite white men mostly talked about, quote unquote, slaves in Africa or slaves in the colonies. It would be that type of mindset. So Syed writes on page 214 that early works written about the East were quote, were no intellectual luxury, but an imperial obligation, meaning that they were used by the leaders of empires to dominate the East. So this is really important for Syed because the Europeans would send out scribes and investigators to these places, like his quote says, this was not just, oh, we're just going out in the world to seeing what's going on, a lot of these investigations and going out to observe the quote unquote orient was to continue this flow of imperialism and domination and they needed to do. Yes, exactly. They needed to do these things in order to maintain a status quo. You need to figure out what's out there and how you can use it to your advantage and a lot of these historians and scholars and explorers that was their task, they were tasked by the kings and the empires to go do so. Well, on that note, I think it's important because we have been talking about kind of how important Syed's ideas are and how foundational they are to understanding power dynamics, but there is kind of a problem with this idea of orientalism. Penn, do you want to talk about it? So if we are aware of the idea of orientalism and the various tropes that come along with it, we may try to resist it, like resist the tropes of orientalism, but by actually resisting these tropes about orientals, we actually play into it, right? So for example, if I was to prove that I'm a westernized Chinese person, which I'm not. You can say, how about you say, if you were to prove that you are a westernized Thai person, what do you do, your own personal example. Oh, I see, I see. Or do you not try? Thai people don't try to appear westernized, actually. Yeah, that's true. It's actually like, what about Americanized? You approve that you're not an Americanized Thai person. Oh, really? Oh, really? Yeah. Really? So maybe you can take up this example. So an example is to prove that I am a westernized Chinese person, I purposefully do things that do not appear to be Chinese at face value, right? So I take up certain hobbies that you wouldn't associate to an Asian person. I go mountain biking, I go paddling, I purposefully tan my skin because that is the exact opposite of the Chinese standard of beauty, right? I do not watch anime, I don't listen to Asian music, I don't watch Asian dramas. But the problem here is that by avoiding it, by resisting, I am actually reproducing the tropes, right? I'm validating these Asian stereotypes by putting effort into avoiding them. And that's one of the problems that arises when you're thinking about orientalism, is that by avoiding them, you're still reinforcing them. So what are some reasons why you would want to avoid these stereotypes? So I think one of the main motivators is that like we were talking about with binaries, right, us versus them, western versus eastern, in our current social world, the West is seen as powerful, as dominant, and the East is seen as weak and the society that gets dominated over. And so a motivator for not wanting to appear to Eastern is that you want to appear part of the dominant group, right? This is when you're in the dominant space. So like living in America, you want to appear like an Americanized Chinese person rather than a Chinese person. Yeah, but I think, and this is my own experiences, I think in East Asia, even if you're in an Eastern space, you still want to appear as a western Chinese person or Asian person, right? Because there's power to that. That shows those around you that hey, I understand the dominant culture, I'm savvy in it, because that's cultural capital right there, right? That's interesting because in Thailand, if you appear to non-tie, like if you're to Americanize or westernize, you're actually not, you don't do very well is my understanding. Like you're not really considered an insider, at that point you're just an outsider. So that's interesting. So in the space like that, you wouldn't want to appear to Americanize or to westernize because then you wouldn't fit in. But I can understand being in the dominant space, like if I was in America or somewhere in Europe, then maybe I wouldn't want to appear to Chinese. Like, my accent is one really good defense that I have is, yeah, I don't have a super Chinese or Thai accent, right? And that's usually is enough to have Westerners say, oh, you're okay because you can fit in with us because you don't sound like someone from the Orient. Right. You should already be thinking about this sociological imagination here that just these two examples that Alan and Penn just gave, the role of status and what is considered to be valuable at the time and space and what is legitimate and what is valued. Obviously, in the example that Penn gave, being Americanized is not valued, might not have any status or power or legitimacy in that context, whereas it's opposite in examples that Alan gave. Yeah. And everyone wants, at least initially, New York reaction, thinking very, very individualistic seemingly wants to be part of whatever the in-group is. Yeah. Everyone's wearing a green shirt and you show up wearing a blue shirt, you can be like, what's going on? And you're going to be doing everything. Yeah. We've been socialized to conform. Right. So if you're sending out, then you're not doing it right. Right. So there's a very, I don't want to use the word natural here, but there's a very obvious feeling of when you realize, okay, I'm not blending it. Yeah. And because I'm not blending in, there are social repercussions of that. Listen to our conformity, what up episode? Yes. Exactly. We're in, let's say, Thailand, if no one would give you dirty looks, or whatever happens in Thailand or here, obviously not being a quote-unquote American and you look like the stereotypes of what maybe a Mexican person is or a Muslim person, you're literally being threatened either to get kicked out, go back to another country, like that's why these things are so amazing and powerful. And our model minority episode is also a really good segue into this discussion as well. Yeah. Sorry, I just want to point out that this is a lot to do with identity, right? So this is about changing your identity or conforming your identity or oppressing your identity, you know, for the sake of the dominant culture or group. And that's like what that's the experience of a lot of minorities living in spaces in America, for example, like Native Americans, again, are a great example of this because they have to conform or they won't fit in. Yeah. I think that's where what we're all talking about just touches on how important and powerful side's work is is because he takes this social psychological concept of conformity, identity, groups, and he applies it to history, to politics, to culture, right? And he makes these really great connections and backs it up with all this historical proof, right? And that's where the power of his work comes from, in my opinion. Yeah, no, I was supposed to say that really hits the nail on the head because going back to the entire previous point about resisting these ideas and how does that reproduce the trope because if you were to resist whatever, you know, the stereotype is, though you're resisting it and in your mind you're saying it. be stereotypes, you know, exterotype isn't real, it's not me or it's not us. By the very act of forcibly, consciously resisting that thing, whatever it is that you're trying to do with it, turn your hair the right way, or close music, you're saying you're something real about that. Because you're choosing to never do those things. Afraid of the association, which makes sense. I'm not, it's not to blame yourself. You might not even be doing it consciously, but you may have seen people get in trouble for appearing to different or other that you're like, oh, okay, I'm not going to go and wear hoodie. I don't want to feel like that. Yeah, like I want to be caught in the wrong place, many, many of them with stereotypes. So that's why like systems of domination are so powerful and they can remain to really exist, but just change slightly over time is because even in forms of resistance, it actually gives some sense of realness and then power back to the structure that you want to break down. A lot of legacies and resistance, whether that be on a personal level or on mass scale, really just gives you marginal changes within the same structure, but not fundamentally tearing everything down, which is obviously what people who are caught up in these identity politics and resistance are really trying to do. And it really makes the progress in that area difficult. Yeah, and the other side of the difficulty thing comes from how a lot of these stereotypes operate at seemingly innocuous levels of social interaction where it's like, oh, I thought you would like to eat dog feet because you were Chinese. You know, just like little jokes like that. Or like, oh, I didn't think you'd eat, do you want the fried chicken? Yeah, yeah. But think about how many times somebody's been like, oh, can't offer Omar fried chicken. There's a really good, oh, good. Margaret Cho, the comedian, she's a Korean American comedian, yeah. She has a really great bit about she was in sitting in first class on a plane. And the stewardess comes by and she's sitting maybe three rows back and she sees her going first row, second row. And the lady goes, um, Caesar salad or Asian chicken salad. And then the person chooses. She goes to Caesar salad or Asian chicken salad. And then it gets to her and she's like Caesar salad or chicken salad. Oh, no, that's even more obvious. And then she's like, well, what does she think I'm going to do? She was like, this is not the chicken salad of my answers, you know, who has spitted out or something. And the funny thing is that like Asians, we don't eat salad, like that's not. No, you cook your vegetables because fresh veggies usually carry diseases. Yeah, yeah, you have like pickled veggies that are kind of fresh, but anyways, it's that's so perfect. Dave Chappelle has a very similar bit when he's doing a stand-up. And I actually had this same exact experience right around the time he was doing this bit. So like, I'll just tell you my experience because his bits the same exact thing. I'm in McDonald's or some fast food restaurant and they don't typically serve chicken, but they were doing like chicken sandwiches or chicken chicken something. I don't really remember what it was. But I go in there. I'm probably one of the just a few black people in there because this was in Marlton, which is a predominantly white space in Southern New Jersey. And I go to the register and there's like advertisements for like these new meals. And I'm looking and I can't decide what I want. And then this kid looks at me and he just goes. The cashier. Yeah, the cashier. He looks at me and goes, you know, you're going to get the chicken, aren't you? And like for a half a second, I wanted to get mad. But then I was like, you're fucking right. I do want one. I'm getting the chicken. How did you know that? Everyone like fucking fried chicken. Like it's not a black thing, but like, yeah, that's just so weird. So like when these stereotypes exist at these seemingly innocent levels of interaction, we can laugh about it because it's kind of funny, especially when people try to be so politically correct in these scenarios. But then it's like, what do you do not defend that person? And how much harder it is when it's at more serious levels where it's like, oh, I thought I'm going to hire you for this job because I thought you'd be a good heart worker because you're Chinese. Or I'm not going to hire this job because I thought black people were lazy. You know, all these stereotypes can harm us at larger institutional levels. But at the interpersonal level, it's a little more difficult to actually be like, why don't you get offended by that? You know, like it's, you know, people will say like, don't take it so seriously. I was just making a joke. But at some point, you know, it's not joke anymore. People distinct the world result of revolves around the innocuous and it doesn't. Yeah. Right. There's like these innocuous interactions will build up into something more serious. Like, do I get this job or not? Do I get this? Am I going to get accepted for this apartment rental or not? Right. So yeah, I think we touched on some really interesting things, told some stories or our own experiences. But one thing that we want to end on is some of Saeed's broader questions that he asks his readers and other theorists to think about. So we have four of them for you that you should also think about. First one is, how can we properly represent and study other cultures? I think our cultural appropriation episode is good for this discussion. Oh yeah. Second question is, what is a quote other culture, right? What makes it different from you and yours? The third question to ask yourself is, is it useful to distinguish cultures from each other? Because there are so many pitfalls and drawbacks to the way that we've distinguished cultures from each other in the past and continue to today in our actions, right? And then the last question to consider is, how do certain ideas acquire authority or status over others? Why do certain ideas reign supreme? And that's a big one that Saeed is kind of grappling with throughout this book. Alrighty, that sounds signals at end of this week's show. Per usual, we're going to end with some quick breaks. These are random topics that are current and very newsworthy that I will throw at Penn and Omar who have to do a personal breakdown of the topic in five words or less. I'm going to start with Omar because he already knows his already spoiled it himself. Which is recently a documentary came out on lifetime called "Surviving our Kelly." Since then, there has been a ton of well-deserved and warranted backlash against the singer. Just today, today's, I think, the 17th or 18th, it came out that his label is dropping him and his manager just got arrested for making terroristic threats against one of the families that was accusing our Kelly of taking their daughter in brainwashing him. So Omar, a break it down. I'm going to say. Wait, sorry. Were you guys fans of our Kelly way before all this stuff? I've never been. I've never liked any of his. I believe I can fly. His shit is cheesy. As an official knighted black person, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, black people wake up. That's what I'm going to say to that. We knew this for a long time. I very, very vividly remember having conversations with my brother, Travis and my father about our Kelly. Literally, I was in middle school. I knew because we knew, like, peeing on the girl and like, the boondocks did a funny skit on him and Dave should've held me funny. Everybody already knew this. This just reminds me of, huh? Sorry, I think when, because that whole video came out when we were in middle school and when I heard about it, I did not know that the girl in the video was 13 years old. I thought she would, because I didn't watch it. I didn't go seek it out. It was just like you said. It was a skit on the chappelle show. It was something that you laughed about and you weren't aware that it was a child. He's pissing on a child. He's raping a child. It is, anyway, sorry. No, it's okay. It's, and I'm saying black people wake up because, in one sense, since we were talking about identity, in one sense, our Kelly did play a very, very significant role in black culture and black music, especially when it comes to the church. His music was, I'm really like, very quote-unquote like mainstream or traditional black weddings. His music was probably played at every single one of them. When people hear his songs, they remember very specific moments in their life. Aside from that, his music career is prolific. He was not just some regular person. Bill Cosby was the guy on TV. Our Kelly was the guy on M Music. Michael Jackson as well. You want to shriek when you hear things like this, but how could you possibly ruin music or entertainment? People need to get over that because we also knew that he was doing this. It's crazy. But that's also the problem. It's like, I mean, it's the same thing with all these other celebrities, like being absent. And it's, everybody's like, yeah, he's been kind of been doing that forever. It comes to question of like, how do you know this, but yet can just ignore that reality? and continue to consume the thing that that person produces. - So they were all complicit. - Yeah, I think that's the biggest thing in that documentary is about how everyone was complicit, you know, it wasn't a secret. Okay, Penn, you ready for your quick break? All right, we're gonna get political. - Okay. - Within the past week, Hawaii Congresswoman, Tulsi Gabbard announced that she is winning. (laughing) She is writing for President in 2020 on Van Jones's, I think it was a show on CNN. Break it down because I also wanna know how political I can get on our Twitter about this. - I think you can get political, I don't care about that. - Thank you. - Do whatever you want. - Okay. - My breakdown would be, Hawaii don't be fooled. - Hawaii, just Hawaii? - Particularly Hawaii, but also the rest of the US, I would say. - Everyone don't be fooled. - Maybe that's the best. Like everyone don't be fooled. - Yeah. - But I know a lot of people in Hawaii particularly are like, she's from Hawaii, supporter. - Yeah. - And it's like, no, no, don't try to support her because she's from Hawaii. - Forget that. - No, no, no, no. - There's a great article I had read about, it was like Tulsi Gabbard is not your friend. And it's a really great, almost too long analysis of all the different problematic stances she's had in various political issues and things like that. So, she is beautiful, I'll say that. - She's charismatic, she's very charismatic. But it's like, she is more about ambition than anything is my understanding. So, I mean, this is as political as we're gonna get on the show, but you guys can, listeners, you can disagree, agree, but don't be fooled. - I mean, I think that's the same with any politician, just like do your research. - Yes, please. - What are her actual stances? Like don't be like starry eyed by like, oh, it's like a young and upcoming, you know, like even like Ocasio or Cortez, when she was coming up, it was like, okay, who are you? - Yeah. - And you really gotta represent a younger generation. You gotta be really good. - Yeah. - Good, I think we should leave it at that 'cause I feel like we could all three of us have been together for like four hours later. (laughing) - As soon as you've started mentioning that, not our color thing, as soon as I mentioned, I literally started sweating. (laughing) - It got 10 degrees hotter in here, my feet are hot, my armpits are wet. - It's not too subject, it's not too touching. - Alrighty, thanks for listening to The Social Breakdown. We really appreciate it. If you are interested in Orientalism or our stamps on Kelsey Gabbard for the 2020 Presbyncy fall or Twitter, fall or Twitter. No, if you're interested in Orientalism and would like to get a little bit more information on the works we cited today, you can check out our website, thesocialbreakdown.com, that's the socialbreakdown.com. We list all of the articles, scholars, and books that we discussed in today's episode, as well as provide links to other relevant materials that you may find helpful. You can also find us on Facebook or Twitter, and you can send in your questions to @socialbreakdown, that's @socbreakdown. Also, you can subscribe to our podcast wherever you get your podcasts, and be sure to rate us when you do. Tune in next week until then, stay social. - Thanks, social. - Read books, made-of-girl, read books. - Hey, man, are you talking to your baby girl? - Yes. - Yes. (laughing) - Yeah!