생시몽(Saint-Simon) 그리고 동양 ― ‘정신 진보’의 거대서사와 동양의 부재 ―

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to analyze the orientalist discourse of Saint Simon on the base of the analyzes of the modern orientalism by Edward W. Said that criticize the understanding of the Other which, based on the notion of exteriority, tends to fix the identity and the nature of the Other in various categories formed in his own culture. Firstly, in order to understand the problematic of Saint-Simon, convinced of the progress of the human spirit, this paper tries to regard the ideas of Saint-Simon as the one of the social transition that could not be limited in the French society. In the second part of this work, it is important to examine his discourse which is part of a eurocentric perspective on the history of civilizations. Finally, the paper tries to understand Saint-Simon’s discourse about the civilization in order to prepare future work for the analyze of the visions of the Saint-Simonians such as the ‘civilizing mission’ and the ‘association of the Orient and the Occident’. In short, this work intends to show that the discourse of Saint-Simon on the Orient is related more to his doctrine than to the Orientals considering that the Orient is generally excluded from their discourse on the Orient.