200YEARS-010724 - Flipbook - Page 17
Pre-Post Modern Civilization
Professor Apinan Poshyananda, Ph.D.
in 1857 prints of the Siamese embassy led by Phraya Montri Suriyawong (Chum
Bunnag) crawling before Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle to present tributes
Cultural theorist and critic, Edward Said, introduced the concept of Orientalism, that generated substantial interest in the British press3.
which refers to Western vision that perceives cultural diversity of Asia as strange
and foreign. This generalized viewpoint has engendered misconceptions In 1861, Siam sent an embassy led by Chao Phraya Siphiphat (Phae Bunnak)
about Eastern cultures and races and the reproduction of misrepresentations to deliver a royal letter to Emperor Napoleon III and Empress EugŽnie at the
depicting the East as unchanging, frozen for hundreds of years. This has justified Fontainebleau Palace. The reception garnered both positive and negative
the West9s perceived superiority and the need to bring development, religious reactions, particularly criticism of the Siamese delegates9 crawling behavior
beliefs, and arts to Eastern societies. Orientalism thus became an essential lens as disorderly and uncivilized and disparaging comparisons to monkeys, insects
through which the East was viewed as underdeveloped. Said criticized how and reptiles. These commentaries reflected deeply ingrained French attitudes
art and literature created an
