Comments on: An Oriental Gives Up

By: tvwatcher

tvwatcher — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 21:17:05 +0000

If you watched the show, the words are meant to symbolise East and West as in (Oriental and Occidental) and that the search for good investors in not local but global. People need to be a bit more thick skinned. Some one is offended by something always. Get a life, as another TV programme on that channel says.

By: Sujatha

Sujatha — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 07:00:51 +0000

Hi, Since I work on the show "Oriental and Occidental" felt the need to defend the same.The show not the title.Sorry,people..but sumtimes in a drive to find a catchy name ( especially amongst ho-hum business shows)one goes to crazy lenghths.The above is just a case in point. The title is just meant to reflect the fact tht most of the interviews are being shot at and based on Asian market leaders and the emerging Asian markets.

And from what i've been told u need to cme up wid such stuff for hard core business news viewers of CNBC.

By: Sin

Sin — Tue, 13 Dec 2005 03:22:28 +0000

I get immensely confused when in London, because desis are “Asian” and people from the Far East are “Oriental”. It’s terrifying, the constant awareness of a potentially non-PC misstep, especially here.

By: Reincarnation

Reincarnation — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 20:26:40 +0000

When I was in school, a friend from Taiwan once had these wise words for me: "Remember, when you use the word Oriental, you are describing a rug or a vase and not a human being."

By: A. Rickey

A. Rickey — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 07:17:32 +0000

If you study any Asian language at Oxford, you'll still get a degree in "Oriental Studies." It shows up on my degree certificate, and I put it on my resume.

Much of the rest of the world simply isn't as cursed with our PC obsessions, having (mostly) been absent the blessings of Said & Co, PC Investigators. Frankly, the objection to the word is a little tiresome. I'd expect that an Indian TV network will pay more attention to the OED (which omits the whining) and ignore American Heritage, for obvious reasons.

By: aranyi

aranyi — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 06:01:48 +0000

I wonder they’re as loaded terms for native resident Indians as they seem in the west. When I came to study in teh states, I was literally FOB, unaware of the race/class/gender/ethnicity politics that I would soon be subjected to, simply because I was coming from a land in which i was the hegemony, I was the default. Edward Said and Orientalism didn’t seem relevant, because the ‘other’ was the west (however much we seem to want to be them). For us, Oriental will still be ‘chinky’ people (I know its racist in the states, but its a simple description, get over it already), and not the near east or a state of mind that we’re subjected to by the West. I’ll pass the article on to a friend who works there and see what she says! Maybe the very idea of a binary (us and them – whichever side of the equation one is on), is a default human trait? That’s a dangerous assumption because it could be used to justify a lot of vile acts.