Abstract

This article revisits Edward Said’s Humanism and Democratic Criticism (2004) in order to argue that in this book and elsewhere in his works, Said tries to promote a vision of humanism, a philosophical school often maligned by so many radical thinkers including Michel Foucault. Written in the aftermath of the tragic events of 9/11, Said’s book, this article argues, not only helps us rethink the relationship between the East and the West, it also helps us bridge the disconnect between the University and the community. Foregrounding Foucault’s opposition of land and body or sovereignty or power, this article shows how Said refutes Foucaultian post-structuralism’s obsession with power at the expense of land and space in order to imagine a vision of a humanist world which is still political, still capable to engaging with difference and otherness.