Based on Said's Orientalism as the background and context, this paper combs and examines Charles Hallisey's Roads Taken and Not Taken in the Study of Theravada Buddhism, a famous article in the history of criticism of Western Buddhist research, and makes its own comments. The paper mainly points out the two characteristics of "intercultural mimesis" and "elective affinity" in the study of Theravada Buddhism, by which Hallisey highlights and looks forward to the new paradigm of local Buddhist research opposite to Orientalism.