Document Type : Original Article
Author
Graduate of the Department of Iranology, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, University of Tehran
10.30484/jii.2025.3355.1105
Abstract
Since the Safavid era, Iran has been of increased interest to Orientalists and European researchers. Their efforts to understand Iran led to the formation of academic Iranology in the West. Among European states, Britain, France, and Germany were pioneers. Undoubtedly, the most significant factor in these countries' attention to research on Iran was the important developments of the 20th century. Factors such as the competition between major states in the Middle East over oil acquisition, energy management, and geopolitical issues heightened the importance of Iran in their foreign policies. Accordingly, the expansionist and colonialist behaviors and thoughts of European governments should be analyzed and interpreted in this context.
While the approach to Orientalism in Germany was scientific and academic in nature, as the Germans did not have political and economic interests in the East and in Iran, Orientalism and Iranology gradually distanced themselves from colonial methods more or less outwardly from the second half of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and entered a new era. This is especially notable regarding the activities of Iranology and its growth in recent decades. The activities of Iranians living in Europe provided great attraction for European researchers, leading to the emergence of a large generation of Iranologists in the second half of the twentieth century in Europe. They created important works in various fields such as linguistics, philology, history, literature, art, manuscripts, archaeology, architecture, Islamic religions and sects, mysticism, Sufism, and other branches of Iranian culture and civilization.
It is certain that, despite the fact that Orientalism and Iranology have always been linked to political issues, European Iranologists played a crucial role in recognizing Iranian identity and helping to understand and develop the foundations of Iranian nationalism. Although there has been some criticism of their research, the methods and approaches of these Iranologists have been continued by Iranian researchers as a model for research in these fields. The most significant influence of the great European Iranologists on Iranian researchers was the issue of methodology, or "methodology", which had a great impact on the methodicalization and scientificization of humanities and Iranology research in Iran.
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