Title and Intertextual Practice

Abstract

This study seeks to explore the components of poetic titling, its semantic forms, conceptual framework, and the procedural mechanisms that contribute to its analysis. It takes as its corpus the works of the Yemeni poet Ahmad al-ʿAwādī, employing tools of intertextuality and the procedures of the French semiotic method as instruments for examining and uncovering meaning structures. The research is organized into an introduction, a theoretical framework, two main sections, and a conclusion. The theoretical framework addresses the key theoretical concepts; the first section focuses on external titles and the heritage component, while the second examines internal titles and the employment of heritage within the poetic text. The study concludes that titles function as procedural keys that offer the reader an anticipatory vision of the text and provide a concentrated semantic charge that motivates exploration of its aesthetic dimensions. Nevertheless, titles are not merely Para textual or parallel texts but constitute integral components of the text’s structural and semantic fabric. They interact dynamically to generate the overall meaning of the text. Any analytical separation between them and the main text remains a methodological distinction intended to facilitate study; therefore, titles cannot be examined in isolation from their textual contexts.