Журнал Фронтирных Исследований (May 2018)

The splendours and miseries of pyramidology, or the frontier cases of (not)knowledge: from orientalism to alientalism

  • Максим Валерьевич Кирчанов

DOI
https://doi.org/10.24411/2500-0225-2018-00011
Journal volume & issue
no. 2
pp. 89 – 103

Abstract

Read online

The author analyzes marginal theories and concepts that emerged as lateral and dead-end branches in the history of Western Orientalism. It is assumed that marginal intellectuals falsified historical sources. The goals of these falsifiers could be different, ranging from the desire to make a contribution to science, to make the history of their community more ancient or to obtain financial benefits. Three generations of falsifiers developed a marginal and non-academic discourse of Orientalism. The author believes that marginal intellectuals transformed Orientalism into Alientalism. Alientalism became a successful market project of a modern consumer society. Alientalism blurred the rigid boundaries between the various forms of knowledge and ignorance, turning them into a mobile frontier contact zone, where the non-academic theories continue to emerge.

Keywords