Meyda Yegenoglu's "Colonial Fantasies:Towards a Feminist Reading of Orientalism" (Book Note)

 

In "Colonial Fantasies," Yegenoglu posits that the complex impacts of orientalism and its agents cannot be simply dismissed as a challenge to hegemonic power or the unity of the Orientalist tradition. Yegenoglu's primary focus in revising Said is on the veil, employing a Lacanian psychoanalytic approach. She argues that the veil functions as a prototypical orientalist and modernist fantasy. In the imagination of Western male observers, the veil fetishizes the "oriental" woman while simultaneously rendering the observer invisible, especially to himself. This usage of the veil in orientalist discourse is likened to the fantasy of the liberal, autonomous Western subject and is integral to the discursive dynamics that establish a sovereign subject for the West.

 

Yegenoglu's essays draw on a range of scholars, including Nietzsche, Derrida, and Bhabha, emphasizing the centrality of the unconscious in feminist analyses of orientalism. The veil serves as a heuristic site for exploring colonial desire and sexuality in her work.

 

However, the passage notes certain drawbacks in Yegenoglu's writing, including repetitiveness and the potential loss of critical points in extensive genealogical expositions of scholars like Robert Young and Judith Butler. Yegenoglu is criticized for rarely addressing specific historical events, with the exception of a brief examination of the resistance of Algerian women during the struggle for independence from the French. Notably, her treatment of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's harem writings aligns well with Lewis's analysis of Browne's travels to Turkey. Together, these discussions highlight that, for many Westerners since the eighteenth century, "the Orient" was often conceptualized as the vast Ottoman Empire, accessible both imaginatively and geographically due to its proximity to Europe.

 

In a brief exploration of more recent instances where Western female observers subjected "Eastern" women to scrutiny, Yegenoglu specifically addresses Ruth Woodsmall's writings from the 1930s and Juliette Minces's from the 1980s. Her aim is to critique Western feminism's association with the enduring legacy of academic and popular orientalism. While sympathetic to this project, the author expresses a desire for greater precision regarding the identities and political commitments of Woodsmall and Minces, and how they represent Western feminism across different historical contexts. Without such details, the critique appears somewhat arbitrary, potentially diminishing its effectiveness.

 

However, Yegenoglu provides a captivating narrative on how Mustafa Kemal utilized women's attire as a symbol of modernity within the framework of programmatic nationalism in twentieth-century Turkey. The discussion around "feminist orientalists" raises curiosity about applying the psychoanalytic framework developed in the initial part of the book to this specific scopic regime of modernity. Doing so could unveil the intricate dynamics of sexual desire that Yegenoglu compellingly argues for, shedding light on its presence not only in imperialist projects but also in nationalist and anticolonialist endeavors.