orientalism

After listening to Edward Said talk about Orientalism I have been thinking a lot about framing and the different stereotypes that have been constructed for different ethnic and racial groups. It brought me back to a time in high school when my German teacher told us a story about something that had happened to her when she was young. Sara is full German. She was born and raised speaking German and only started learning English when she hit the age of 5. In middle school she would tell everyone that her goal in life was to become a German teacher. Many people would tell her that her dreams of becoming an educator were great. But in 7th grade when she told her teacher of her dream to one day become a German teacher she was given a negative response. Her teacher told her that becoming a German teacher was a horrible idea and that all Germans were bad people. Sara was confused, but it was only until her teacher told her that she was Jewish and that her relatives were killed by Nazi's that Sara started to understand. Her teacher said that all German people are bad people because of Hitler and all the Nazi's that killed all the innocent Jewish people. Sara was confused because she was not alive during this time period and had nothing to do with the Holocaust. She was being targeted by her teacher because of her German heritage. She apologized to her teacher on behalf of all Germans and was really hurt by the fact that her teacher thought all German people were bad people, even in today's society, for what happened years ago. Her teacher was appreciative of her apology, but she said that her mindset on German people would never go away because of what they did to her family. Today, this is how many people on our society view the middle east because of 9/11 and the war. In class my group questioned if America and the middle east will ever be able to live in peace and coexist with one another. A really good point was brought up that said certain generations will probably never fully be able to have peace with countries that they have had wars or violence with. While our generations might not have peace with the middle east, our children may not have peace with another country that they have violence with. Because of wars and violence, I think that a country will always have a preconceived notion for other countries based on their relationship during different time periods.