What the Rest Think of the West

Western civilization has long enjoyed an expansive and flexible geographic domain, yet Westerners have observed other cultures with little interest in a return gaze. This fixed lens ignores insights that only cultural outsiders can provide. Focusing on four civilizations -Islamic, Japanese, Chinese, and South Asian- What the Rest Think of the West collects observations made over centuries by scholars, diplomats, missionaries, travelers, merchants, and students commenting on what they define as the "West". With informative introductions to the selections, Laura Nader challenges us to study how others see us in order to begin to see ourselves.