W okowach przemocy epistemologicznej: parę uwag o tematyce orientalistyki postkolonialnej

ENArticle discusses the development of the conception of the Orientalism in the context of postcolonial discourse, revealing the necessity to take account of the religious pluralism and to deepen comparative dialogism both between and within cultures. Primarily author is concerned with calling into question Western hegemonies and paradigms of knowledge and highlighting the cultural and material violence of Western colonialism. The problem for postcolonial theory has been that of finding a moral platform from which to speak and recognition of solidarity' both among the oppressed and between divergent groups, having excluded the possibility of a humanistic appeal to a common human nature. Paradoxically, Orientalism is often caught in a dialectical tension between the extremes of universalism and pluralism: it tends towards a universalistic outlook which transcends cultural boundaries and encourages an inter-cultural perspective, yet increasingly it also seeks to affirm local and regional differences and to nurture the unique particularity of cultures. Keywords: Orientalism, Postmodernism and Postcolonial discourse, cultural hermeneutics.