Textual Practices and Global Contexts of Intellectual History

Statement about the conference “Areas and Disciplines” by Stefan Leder

This paper explores in how far the perpetual production of contemporary significance of the – textual – past may contribute to widening our common notion of the category of intellectual history. Arguing against the mainstream of a “presentalist teleology”, we reconsider sophisticated textual practices of conservation, adaptation and dissemination of texts. They exemplify a plurality of wide spread, if not universalized epistemological and intellectual frameworks which predate and inform modernity. The concept of historicity, often used as a colonial tool projecting true-false dichotomies, may thus be complemented by a more inclusive vision of interrelated contexts.