A central concern of Arab American studies has always been the representations of Arabs in U.S. popular culture and the real consequences that these typically negative and stereotypical images have had. My work intervenes in the scholarship on representations of Arabs by analyzing a key component of the production, transmission, and reception of stereotypical images: the complex ways that Arab Americans themselves have deployed these representations. Arab Americans have a long history of adapting Orientalist imagery from U.S. popular culture (e.g. camels, deserts, sheiks, and “harem girls”), and utilizing these images to market an “authentic” cultural identity. Following the long line of scholars that have mobilized and modified Edward Said’s framework, my use of the term self-Orientalism refers to the ways that Arab Americans have strategically deployed Orientalist imagery and rhetoric as a representational practice within liberal multiculturalism. Even though this complex process of self-Orientalism has been a constant in Arab American communities for a century, scholars have largely ignored this rich site of analysis, opting instead to focus on representations of Arabs in U.S. popular culture. There has yet to be a sustained critique of the Orientalist representations that emanate from the Arab American community. What are the ramifications for Arab American studies, an emerging field that relies so heavily on Said’s Orientalism, when the communities we study engage in the same processes that we critique? How can we effectively offer scholarly critiques of the communities that we work with? For example, scholars of Arab American studies have only recently begun dealing with the racism and gender issues that exist within the Arab American community, but at what cost? One solution is to examine the structures in which these practices (racism, self-Orientalism, etc.) develop and are sustained, both within and outside of the community. To ignore these issues in favor of not airing dirty laundry is a disservice to the discipline and the communities that we work with. My paper will not only examine the history of self-Orientalism within Arab American communities, but will also offer strategies for the dilemma of scholarly critique.