Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Orientalism

Academia long discarded Edward Said's theory "Orientalism" as outdated and too structualist without however realizing that worldwide ignorance in regards to culture and ethnicity is still trickling its nasty tale behind glitz and glamout of modern metropolises. Were we a bit too in a rush to state that we are already past the primitive orientalism and exoticism of XX century? just to find us again in the midst of mass re-production of "otherness" of XXI century? How far are we from wearing again the "banana skirt" and dancing on the stage of La Scala?

Found this website and the description of services provided by "Oriental" people.
If "Oriental" do still exist in our "civilized" twenty first imagination, then it is certainly a symptom of underlying disease called contemporary racism.

Here I quote excerpt from the website http://www.orientalnannies.com/ and according to the site the definition of "oriental" is as follows:

"5 reasons to choose ‘Oriental Nannies’


• If you are specifically looking for oriental staff we are here to help - Our large pool of oriental domestic staff, enables us to send you more oriental applicants than any other agency in the UK.

• ‘Oriental Nannies’ gives you value for money, charging less, with our flat fees and we give you 6 month guarantee! (see our terms of business)

• We offer a risk free 2 week trial period-which means you have 2 weeks to get to know your new employee and ensure you are both comfortable with the arrangement.

• As parents ourselves, we understand your needs and concerns.

We shall satisfy all our clients with superior quality service, quality applicants, excellence, leadership and integrity in the industry".