##"Orientalism", imaginative geography and the family action space of Palestinian industrial entrepreneurs
Edward Said's work contains powerful assertions as to the relevance of spatial categories as constituting elements of the discourse of orientalism. [...] there are three areas in which the construction of Orientalist discourse rests on a certain mutual articulation of space and the social sphere: a) the essentialisation of culture, b) the homogenisation of culture, c) a static understanding of culture. Departing from these assumptions on the role of spatiality in Orientalist discourse the second part of the paper examines the use of the concept of "family business" in empirical research. It is argued that the "family business" has been interpreted in terms of the conceptual matrix of the oriental "family", as a constituting and stable element of Middle Eastern societies which is ubiquitously characterized by the same set of typical norms, revolving around age, gender, origin and so on. As a result, family businesses are generally understood as bounded and static spatial units which determine the legitimacy of fixed patterns of social action. Empirical research on Palestinian entrepreneurs shows that, in contrast to this image, the space of the family business is shaped by complex articulations of traditional norms of the family and requirements of successful management which are fraught with ambiguity and conflict. The "family business" should be understood as a dynamic space which is acted upon and modified in relation to globally available models of business administration. The example of the notion of "family business" shows the broader value of discourse analysis à la Foucault for geography by critically assessing taken-for-granted concepts of space, and assumptions about the way spatiality structures social worlds.##
Keywords: orientalism, Said, E., Palestinian entrepreneurs, spatiality in Orientalist discourse, discourse analysis
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