Textual behavior

The textual behavior (Engl. Textual attitude ) is a not-strictly-terminological designation for the authoritative power of a text about reality. The term was largely coined by the Orientalism critic Edward Said .

For example, the alienating representation of an ethnic group or culture in travel reports can be referred to as “textual behavior”: Here, “the foreign” is understood from previous fictional knowledge brought along. Edward Said explains this behavior using the example of the "wild lion": a person who has already read a lot about the literarily dramatized "wild lions" will, in the real encounter with a lion, primarily with his previous literary experience - i.e. as a "Wild" and dangerous animal - interpret. Similarly, the fear of the great white shark - which is realistically unfounded but shaped by modern literature and film - can apply. (The term usually does not refer to the human-animal relationship, but human-human.)

“Two situations favor textual behavior. One of them is when a person is confronted with something relatively unknown at close range; with something threatening that was previously removed. In such a case, consider not only what was news in a previous experience, but also what one read about it. Travel books or guidebooks are just as "natural" a type of text, as logical in their composition and use as any book one might think of, precisely because there is this human tendency to fall back on a text when the uncertainties of traveling to foreign territory seem to threaten the balance. "

- Edward Said :

criticism

Ibn Warraq criticizes Said's concept of "textual behavior" as one that tries to disguise a banality.

Individual evidence

↑ There is no article in the current lexica, but it is usually used terminological.
↑ See Abdallah, Laila: Islamic Fundamentalism - a fundamental misperception? , P. 21. Available from Google Books .
↑ See Ashcroft, Bill / Ahluwalia, D. Pal S .: Edward Said , Google Books , p. 64.
↑ See Said, Edward: Orientalismus , Frankfurt am Main: Ullstein 1981, p. 108.
↑ See cultural reception of the great white shark .
^ Said, Edward: Orientalism , Frankfurt am Main: Ullstein 1981, p. 108. The second favorable situation is the prospect of success of the literary image. Here Said cites the lion example.
↑ Warraq, Ibn: Orientalism: Debunking Edward Said on islam-watch.org : "There are, as I shall show, several contradictory theses buried in Said's impenetrable prose, decked with post-modern jargon (" a universe of representative discourse ", "Orientalist discourse") [...] and pretentious language which often conceals some banal observation, as when Said talks of "textual attitude", when all he means is "bookish" or "bookishness". "

[1] There is no article in the current lexica, but it is usually used terminological.

[2] See Abdallah, Laila: Islamic Fundamentalism - a fundamental misperception? , P. 21. Available from Google Books .

[3] See Ashcroft, Bill / Ahluwalia, D. Pal S .: Edward Said , Google Books , p. 64.

[4] See Said, Edward: Orientalismus , Frankfurt am Main: Ullstein 1981, p. 108.

[5] See cultural reception of the great white shark .

[6] Said, Edward: Orientalism , Frankfurt am Main: Ullstein 1981, p. 108. The second favorable situation is the prospect of success of the literary image. Here Said cites the lion example.

[7] Warraq, Ibn: Orientalism: Debunking Edward Said on islam-watch.org : "There are, as I shall show, several contradictory theses buried in Said's impenetrable prose, decked with post-modern jargon (" a universe of representative discourse ", "Orientalist discourse") [...] and pretentious language which often conceals some banal observation, as when Said talks of "textual attitude", when all he means is "bookish" or "bookishness". "