ABSTRACT
This chapter explores discourses of culture as things that we construct in order to make sense of culture, but which then take on a life of their own and can easily begin to dominate what we think is real about culture. Discourses are specialised ways of talking and writing that belong to particular groups, such as technical, professional, academic and political. The power possessed by discourses to impose a particular reality gives them a central role in acts of chauvinism such as sexism and racism. It can be argued that groups of academics get into small culture formation with respect to the construction and reification of ideas, to give an outward impression of objective professionalism. A major cultural resource that Nada draws upon in the narrative is dominant positivist essentialist literature. More complexity regarding discourses of culture emerges of the narrative about Nada, Osama and Jahan.
