ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a selected finding from an analysis of the contents of German- and English-language guidebooks about Dubai. It provides insights into the construction and/or exploitation of this booming destination by guidebooks as well as critically examining guidebooks' self-assigned role as intercultural mediators. The contribution begins with a conceptual introduction to the complex medium of the guidebook, with a particular emphasis on conditioning. Current developments that are increasingly altering the conceptual self-image of guidebooks will be explicitly identified in this context. In this context at least from an intercultural perspective one should not place too high expectations on guidebooks on Dubai, either. The fictional aspect and the staging of the travel experience are not aberrations of modern mass tourism; instead, the tourist viewpoint has always been unrealistic. It is no accident that it developed in close association with literary and other aesthetic forms.
