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Cultural Tourists
By Jeremy Boissevain
 Cultural tourism has a number of particular, sometimes contradictory, characteristics. For instance, compared to recreational tourists, cultural tourists encounter a much wider section of the native population as they visit villages and towns remote from coastal tourist zones. There natives have often not (yet) developed the skills required to cope with mass tourism. While this may mean that initially they are more hospitable, they are also more vulnerable and easily exploited. As the local population becomes more familiar with tourism and gains expertise, it becomes more active in protecting its interests (see Cohen 1979: 24; Pi Sunyer 1989).
One of the most striking characteristics of tourism is the way it promotes self-awareness, pride, self-confidence and solidarity among those being visited (see Boissevain 1992b; Sofield 1991). This is especially pronounced if the host community is remote or in other ways peripheral, as are so many tourist destinations. All the contributions to this volume demonstrate this. This self-awareness is brought about by the regular presence of outsiders, which automatically creates categories of 'we' and 'they', insiders and outsiders, hosts and guests. By being looked at, examined and questioned by strangers, locals become aware of how they differ from the visitors. It is a source of pride that affluent strangers choose to come to their community to admire -- for why else would they come rather than go elsewhere? -- the surroundings and customs that they had always taken for granted. The heightened self-confidence in part compensates for some of the negative aspects of tourism. Later they may discover -- as the Kotzebue Eskimo did when they observed tourists' horrified reactions to their fish-drying and butchering practices -- that some tourists come to sneer and confirm their own superiority ( Smith 1989b). These communities have discovered themselves through the interest of tourists. This has encouraged reflection about their own traditions and culture and stimulated the preservation of moribund crafts and rituals. This in turn has fed the more general revitalisation of celebrations taking place throughout Europe ( Boissevain 1992a). Moreover, the importance of tourist attention and revenue has given marginal host communities the confidence and leverage to bargain for more rights from superior authorities. Nogués Pedregal observed that Zahareños used the municipality's failure to share the tourism-generated tax revenue to buttress their claim for greater independence. Self-awareness due to the presence of tourists can thus be actively used by local residents as a new resource (see Crystal 1989: 151; van den Berghe 1994: 145f.; Crain forthcoming).
National and regional tourist authorities usually commoditise and market local culture without consulting the inhabitants (see Greenwood 1989: 180). This can lead to tension between the tourists, who not surprisingly demand access to the sites and events they have been promised and have paid for, and the inhabitants whose culture, often unbeknownst to them, has been sold to visitors. Crain describes the resentment of inhabitants of many municipalities surrounding Almonte at the way tourist agencies, together with the local religious and commercial elite, converted both solemn rituals and local forests into tourist assets for their own benefit. Peter Odermatt's account of the clash between the inhabitants of Abbasanta and regional authorities in Sardinia over the representation of and tourist access to their local monument illustrates this same issue.
Curiosity, stimulated by skilful marketing, can lead to yet another characteristic of cultural tourism: the loss of privacy. As tourists search for the culture they have paid to see, they cross thresholds and boundaries (sometimes, but not always, hidden) to penetrate authentic backstage areas. The sociologist MacCannell, following Goffman ( 1959), has discussed 'back' and 'front' regions in the context of tourism: 'The front is the meeting place of hosts and guests or customers and service persons, and the back is the place where members of the home team retire between performances to relax and to prepare' ( MacCannell 1976: 92f.). MacCannell's back regions are normally closed to outsiders. Their mere existence implies their possible violation. The back region is somehow more 'intimate and real' as against the front region's 'show'. It is consequently viewed as more 'truthful', more authentic. The back region is where the tourist can experience true authenticity and achieve a oneness with his host ( 1976: 94-99). The desire to penetrate back regions is inherent in the structure of tourism. Tourists thus have a family resemblance ( Blok 1976) to anthropologists, who also seek access to back regions to understand the hidden dimensions of the cultures they study.
Many cases have been reported of tourists looking around in domestic back regions or participating in private events to the discomfort of their unwilling 'hosts'. Puijk describes how curious tourists wandering into private back yards annoy Lofoten islanders. In the Austrian village of Stuhlfelden, German tourists slipped uninvited into a private party where they were observed peering into closed rooms and cupboards ( Droog 1991). The indignant hosts, keenly aware of the community's dependence on German visitors, were afraid to say anything. Similarly, in September 1992, Maltese friends celebrating the annual festa of St Leonard in the village of Kirkop, discovered two tourists peering about inside their house. The curious couple had come to the village with a festa tour, had simply opened the glass inner door and walked into the brightly lit front room. Our friends politely showed them out. Then, to protect their privacy, they were obliged to close the wooden outer door that is always left open during the festa to display festive furnishings and decorations to passers-by. Such blatant infringements of privacy in Malta are increasing (see Boissevain 1996). I think they will continue to occur everywhere as cultural tourism is marketed to the masses.
Another characteristic of cultural tourism is the way massive tourist attention often destroys the very culture that visitors come to examine. Tourist complexes along much of the Mediterranean have demolished tranquillity and the environment. It forces up the cost of real estate, thus driving away the local population. This can transform a living town, an attraction in its own right, into a museum occupied only by the tourist and heritage industries. This is already occurring, among other places, in the centre of Prague and in Mdina, Malta's minuscule walled city ( Boissevain 1994 and 1996). On the other hand, mass tourist attention does not always destroy local customs. The celebrations surrounding the Day of the Dead in the Mexican town of Tzintzuntzan grew spectacularly after the government began to promote it as a tourist spectacle. Brandes, the anthropologist who observed this, encountered no complaints 'about noise, impoliteness, or sacrilege as a result of tourism' ( 1988: 108).
The inhabitants of the more marginal and less-developed tourist destinations are faced with a particular dilemma. Tourists are attracted by their simple, rural way of life and their unspoiled, tranquil environment. These are the characteristics that cause their more affluent and powerful neighbours to regard them as backward. By developing tourism they hope to modernise and escape from the stigma of backwardness. This, in time, will destroy the very features which attract tourists and on which this new industry depends. This has happened in Torremolinos ( Pollard and Rodriquez 1993). Some perceive this dilemma and are disturbed by it, for they too appreciate -- often as a consequence of tourist interest -- their traditional life style. Several chapters herein explore this problem. Abram describes the predicament of stall holders participating in tourist-oriented country markets. They wish to represent themselves as old-fashioned and wholesome, not as backward and ignorant (thus confirming the French stereotype of Auvergnats). She sees this quandary as one of the central issues facing officials seeking to develop tourism in the region. Zahareños face the same paradox. Tourists originally came to the village because it was backward and tranquil. In time, the inhabitants began to see their village through the tourists' eyes as underdeveloped. They now wish to pave and illuminate the streets, as Nogueacute;s Pedregal notes, 'while retaining the idea of the traditional villages shown...and marketed in tourist brochures.'
Cultural tourism, unlike seaside tourism, is not necessarily seasonal. Those who live and work in popular seaside destinations must work extremely hard during the summer months. Once the season is over, they are able to recover from the summer onslaught and resume the more tranquil rhythm of their ordinary lives until the following high season. In contrast, inhabitants of popular cultural destinations, such as historic city centres, are exposed to tourist attention throughout the year. This exposure is increasing as cultural tourism becomes more popular and the number of annual holiday trips grow. Without some respite from the constant demands of tourists, hosts become enervated and their behaviour towards tourists hostile. For example, a negative attitude to tourists is developing among the four hundred residents of Mdina. Whereas just a few years ago, visitors came mainly in summer, they now are present throughout the year. In 1993 the town attracted more than three-quarters of a million visitors ( Boissevain 1994; Boissevain and Sammut 1994). The residents now have little opportunity to recover.
Source: Coping with Tourists: European Reactions to Mass Tourism
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