 The analytical model of Orientalism much influenced the humanities ( e.g. , literary theory and literary criticism ) and especially the field of Middle Eastern studies , where it transformed the academic discourse of the researchers — how they examine , describe and define the cultures of the Middle East . Some academic historians disagreed with his thesis , especially the Anglo – American Orientalist and historian Bernard Lewis . Orientalism derived from Said 's knowledge of colonial literature ( such as that of Joseph Conrad ) , the literary theories of R. P. Blackmur and Raymond Williams , the post @-@ structuralist theories of Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida , and the critical works of Giambattista Vico , Antonio Gramsci and Theodor Adorno . Educated in the Western canon at a British school in Egypt and in the U.S. , Said wrote in his autobiography Out of Place ( 1999 ) that he applied his education and cultural heritages to narrowing the perceptual gaps of political and cultural understanding between the West and the Middle East , improving Western understanding of the Israeli – Palestinian conflict and telling of how a decade @-@ long membership in the Palestinian National Council made him a controversial public intellectual . 
