Edward W. Said
Days 2021
Culture and Power
Culture and Power
Edward W. Said sought to understand the world through culture and its dynamic relationship with political and economic power. Culture is used often by authority to suppress, control, and dominate. But culture is also a tool of resistance and subversion and has its own immanent power. In its third annual Edward W. Said Days, the Barenboim-Said Akademie will examine the relationship between culture and power.
Through music, lecture, art, and film curated by Prof. Dr. Mena Mark Hanna, Dean of the Akademie, students and faculty will embark on an unflinching and critical exploration of, as Said quipped aphoristically, “the power of culture and the culture of powe”. Musical performances will explore the binary of resistance and subservience to power—and often the shades in between—in works of German, Soviet Italian and American composers.
And that is the power of culture,
by virtue of its elevated or superior position to authorize, to dominate, to legitimate, demote, interdict, and validate...
Edward W. Said
Reading Recommendations
Edward W. Said, Culture and Imperialism
Edward W. Said, Power, Politics and Culture
Edward W. Said, Orientalism
Edward W. Said, Parallels and Paradoxes