This article analyses the «prestigious areas of theory» on past and present Spanish Orientalism. To do so, there will be a discussion of the gatekeeping concepts which define the Islamic field and the «threads of meaning» that arise. Given that these concepts and threads are imposed from hegemonic academic centres, the question orienting this text is: to what extent does Spanish Orientalism truly lie on the fringes of such centres and, if this is the case, in what sense? My aim is for the analysis of these questions to enable us to think about what is involved when speaking about academic margins in terms of the Spanish State and, more importantly, the opportunities that exist so as to situate fitting analytical concepts that can respond to particular situations. However, the ultimate aim is to think about the role played by academia in shaping and reproducing ideologies which, to some degree, accommodate power and the logics of ethnic-racial categorisation that characterise social systems in Europe.
Orientalism, theory areas, Islamic field, academic fringes.