Anleitung für die Aneignung der Fremde. Reiseführerliteratur als Medium der Erwachsenenbildung

Guide books provide instructions for the discovery and exploration of new environments. The author identifies educational functions such as selection and directed attention to prepare the object for appropriation. Using pictures, guide books direct the attention to things which are supposedly worth seeing thus functioning as a visual guide. At the same time, in all identifying functions the author draws attention to the medium’s limitation and identifies the resulting limitations to appropriation.