چکیده:
Focusing on the representation of the Kurds in the western travel writings, the present article attempts to identify the rhetorical devices deployed in these texts to textual construction of cultural differences. Our major questions are: "through what rhetorical devices Kurds have been represented and constructed in western travel writing?" and "are these representations consistent"? The rhetorical devices used in these travel texts are numerous and this paper just concentrates on one of these techniques, namely rhetorical trope of aestheticization. We want to know "how many forms does the rhetorical trope of aestheticization take in different periods?" and "has this trope been continued to be used in the later period texts?" Theoretical framework of this study has been built upon insights derivedfrom postcolonial theorists including Said, Spurr, Pratt, and Hall. This approach has served as a basis for several studies aimed at reading cross-cultural encounters. Considering our sample texts are characterized as narrative texts we have adopted a rhetorical analysis. We have divided travel texts into two groups: colonial period texts and postcolonial period ones. Findings indicate that the trope of aestheticization has been widely used and take different forms in the travel texts of both periods. So we witness that this trope is continued to be used in the later period. Finally, we conclude that the discourse of empire is still reproduced in travel texts of the later postcolonial period.6
خلاصه ماشینی:
Beautifying the Other, Rhetorical Analysis of Representations in Western Travelogues Masoud Kowsari 1 Studies of Disconnected Society Sh Assistant Professor, Department of Communication, University of Tehran Mostafa Ahmadzadeh (Scientific-Research) PhD Student, Department of Communication, University of Tehran Vol. 21, No. 1: 47-9 Shapa 9082-0808 Indexed in ISC Received: 2012/04/23 Accepted: 2013/02/18 Abstract The present article is extracted from a thesis that addresses the issue of representing Kurds in Western travelogues and identifying the rhetorical tools used by the aforementioned texts in constructing a cultural difference.
Therefore, the critical postcolonial approach has placed Western travelogues at the center of attention with the aim of first studying their contribution to colonial domination over the non-Western world and second, examining the extent and quality of reproducing Orientalist discourse in later samples of travelogues and travel journalism.
Stuart Hall lists the most important discursive strategies of the system of representation or the discourse of “West and the Rest” as follows and states that “these strategies were all formed through a process known as stereotyping”: idealization (praising the nature and primitiveness of non-Western communities), projection of fantasies related to desire and decadence (erotic fantasies about the East and focusing on the degenerate ritual of cannibalism in the non-Western world), inability to recognize and respect difference and a tendency to impose European categories and norms, a tendency to see difference through the ways of understanding and representing the West (Ibid.
12 Findings Part One - Presenting and Interpreting Examples of the Application of the Aestheticization Strategy in Texts of the Early Period Aestheticization is one of the rhetorical strategies of imperial discourse used in representing non-Western cultures.
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