This approach led Said to ignore several leading researchers who had a decisive influence on Middle Eastern studies. For example, there is his almost complete ignoring of Ignaz Goldziher’s work–which made an undeniable contribution to the study of Islam–since his persona contradicts Said’s claims. Said chose to attack Goldziher’s criticism of anthropomorphism in the Koran as supposed proof of his negative attitude toward Islam, while Goldziher himself felt great respect for Islam and had even attacked Ernest Renan for his racist conceptions.[21] Malcolm Kerr, for example, criticized Said’s ignorance of the role and importance of Arab-American Middle East researchers, who played an important role in the field and could not easily be labeled anti-Arab or anti-Islamic. Reina Lewis and Joan Miller argued that Said ignored women’s voices which, they maintained, contradicted the monolithically masculine representation which Said wished to present.[22] Said’s selectivity enabled him to paint scholarship of the Middle East as an essentialist, racist, and unchangeable phenomenon, whereas the evidence he ignored would have proven that the Western understanding and representation of the Middle East–especially of the Arabs and Islam–had become quite rich and multi-faceted over the years.