[KS] Does "the Orient" still exist?

[Keith Howard]

Speaking from my desk in SOAS -- the School of Oriental and African 
Studies -- I have some sympathy for the thread of discussion, but 
doubt that suitable alternatives can be found. SOAS has been here 
before (my memory of what follows, though, may not be completely 
accurate). In the early 1990s we had lots of discussions about a name 
change, because of the connotations of 'Oriental' and its associated 
terms. Should we become 'School of Asian and African Studies' (no, 
because the acronym looked bad in English, besides which we would 
then limit ourselves to an area called 'Asia' that may or may not 
include so many places we consider integral to us, such as the Middle 
East and Siberia). Then again, we teach about diasporas, and 
certainly include the Caribbean, and we considered joining other area 
studies operations in London, including the 'School of Slavonic and 
East European Studies' (I might have the name slightly wrong), to 
become 'SAS' ('School of Area Studies', or, hopefully capturing the 
whole field, 'School of All Studies'). Again, though, the acronym 
quickly led to us abandoning that proposal. 'SOS', which would have 
kept the Oriental within its 19th century conceptual frame, didn't 
get a look in for obvious reasons.

Our solution, for what it is worth, was to remain 'SOAS'. Rarely, 
though, do you see us write the name out, so 'Oriental' need not be 
mentioned in discussions. The SOAS logo, a green tree of dubious 
provenance in an exact colour shade, plus 'SOAS' in gold writing 
underneath, now forms our trademark, without any expansion to explain 
that this stands for 'School of Oriental and African Studies'. On 
balance, we agreed that we're stuck with the name. I know this is a 
cop out, but perhaps it no longer matters; in other words, I'm not 
sure that terms like "Oriental", "the Orient" and "orientals" are as 
controversial as Tobias presumes. Certainly, when Edward Said gave a 
lecture here at SOAS back in February, he made no reference to our 
unfortunate name.

-- 
Dr Keith Howard
Senior Lecturer in Music, SOAS,
Director, AHRB Research Centre for Cross-Cultural Music and Dance
Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG
Tel: 020 7898 4687; Mobile: 07815 812144; Fax: 020 7898 4519