About Us

About Our Blog:

Orientalism and the Age of Steam is the blog created to accompany the "Orientalism and the Age of Steam" Project; an ongoing presentation and exhibit on the Orientalist movement during the 19th century. We travel to various events, historical or otherwise, to give presentations on not only the Orientalist movement, but the cultures that inspired it as well. What makes us unique from other lectures and presentations is our interactive aspect and our perspective on the subject from being one of the nations fantasized under Orientalism. We bring along our own museum exhibit, featuring contemporary-to-the-era orientalist works, items from the Ottoman, Persian, and Mughal Empires, and a collection costumes carefully reconstructed from extant garments which allows us the opportunity to let our audience members learn in a hands-on fashion.

Our Goal:

Our goal is simply to educate about a part of history that has been our passion. We want to educate and share something that most people would otherwise not learn about, and we want to do it in a way that does not further the damage caused by the initial Orientalist movement. Our blog aims to properly depict our own culture, and the culture of our neighboring former Empires, and illustrate the parallels between truth and fantasy while encouraging the abandonment of further Orientalism (which is still quite prevalent, yet no less offensive). And who knows, perhaps encourage our fellow Middle-Eastern and South Asian kinsmen to join us in filling this gap in historical depictions. Dar nahayat, adam ehsas tanhyi mikone azinke tanhaa 5 irani mese oon bashan ke bazigare naghshaye zhanre tarikhi bashan!