Premise: In addition to laying the groundwork for post-colonial studies as an area of inquiry, the book inspired a flurry of scholarship devoted to the other--to groups of people who, by virtue of race, gender, sexuality, or geographical location, are unable to represent themselves and so (to echo the line from Karl Marx that serves as the book's epigraph) must be represented by those more powerful.

Hypothesis: The book was popular with Marxists and the powerless.
Relation: neutral