Le patrimoine culturel et touristique des Etats-Unis

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Saw a parallel between evolution of society and tourism.

Travelling used to be synonymous with adventure, used to have a purpose, now meaningless with artificial activities.

2. Louis Turner

The Golden Hordes, 1975.

Similar perspective/approach to tourism: saw it as a trivial activity, unimportant, meaningless, reflection of the selfishness of human beings who were only travelling for immediate pleasure. Saw it as a symptom of modern decadence.

3. Erik Cohen

Late 1970s. More optimistic/positive approach. Denounced all previous negative theories → much more moderate/ middle-grounds theory.

For him, tourism very varied, rich. Offering multiple experiences. Impossibility to universalise tourist practices (opposed his predecessors' theories). Different kinds of people may desire different kinds/modes of tourist experiences.

=> Tourism = experience → “experimental”/ “experiental”/ “existential” tourism.

Denounced limited perspectives Boorstin and Turner.

4. Daniel MacCannell

1980s. Really the first who rehabilitated tourism as a positive, good experience. Criticised harshly the stigma on tourism by his predecessors, believed that tourism = a meaningful experience. Not only interested in pleasure.

Made a sort of a religious analogy, sanctified tourism: travelling is something like a pilgrimage, a bit of a quest. Pilgrimage away from your everyday life.

Travelling divided into 3 steps:

- Separation: deciding to move away from a place of origin

- Transition: travelling experience in itself. Travelling = a temporary activity, out of time and space, in-between environments, out of your usual comfort zone.

- Reintegration: return in the sphere of origin.

=> tourism more positively perceived as a quest for authenticity. Necesseray in order to understand the world around, natural inclination human beings to meet people, discover cultures, the world...

“The dvt of a constructed tourist attraction results from how those who are subjects to the tourist gaze respond, both to protect themselves from intrusions in their daily lives backstage, and to take advantage of the opportunities it presents for profitable investments.”

→ Tourism benefits 2 groups: Those who travel and the people visited. Much more complex concept. => A two-way beneficial system.

Fascination of people for the real way of life of other people, desire for authenticity in other places. Desire to be surprised... And not unhealthy curiosity.

→ The Amish; Native American tribes...

5. Maxine Feifer

1985: idea of Post-tourism, directly inspired by post-modernism: became a popular perspective in society → tourism. (Post-modern tourism)

Her theory both challenged and completed previous approaches, not a blunt rejection; synthesis of these theories, with contemporary preoccupations.

Post-tourist = someone completely aware that tourism can be artificial, but goes along with it. Consumer who enjoys multiplicity of tourist forms. Delights in the inauthenticity of the normal tourist experience. A series of constructed attraction and distractions. A conscious game enjoyed with irony. Plays with this idea, moving from one tourist form to another, playing with multiplicity of tourist forms. Embodiment of a society of hyper-consumption, the symbol of a society of globalisation. Aware of the pastiche and hyper-consumerism.

→ Malls in America which have become iconic representations of society. MF analysed and scrutinized tourists who end up strolling in malls, just with a view of enjoying their surroundings, and not necessarily of purchasing anything (Mall of America in Minneapolis): have become more than just a place to buy things, it really is an experience in itself, a place to be visited, just like a museum. Aware that artificial, constructed environment, but part of the game.

Post tourism, just like post-modernism, characterised by the desire to break away from norms/codes/conventions, particularly from codes and conventions of their predecessors = modernism.

- Post modernism entails fragmentation of genres, fragmentation of the universe. → Architecture (contemporary architecture deeply influenced by post-modernism, one good example of city = Las Vegas in Nevada, USA)

- subversion conventions using irony/parody

- end/disappearance traditional boundaries (bw high and low cultures)

- demystification of History, no longer one history supposed to be understood/accepted by everyone, diversity/multiplicity of histories. A way of criticising the world and its dehumanising effects.

Post-modernism → into museums: diversity of cultures taken into account. Can take a look at history from different perspectives (minorities...). Museums tend to reflect this idea. Great interaction bw objects and tourist, +&+ emphasis on the involvement/participation of the tourist into the project, nothing imposed on them.

- A desire to play with the reader (literature)/tourist/viewer (cinema/TV).

- Offers a satire of the world. Denounces the dehumanising effects of an extreme form of capitalism and hyperconsumption. A form of irony and self-reflexivity to denounce dehumanisation of society and dominance of technology and commercialism. Awareness of what is around.

- → Tourists (statue), 1970, Duane Hanson (American scultptor) (Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art).

Post-modernism: Adaptation all these ideas into the tourism indistry.

No longer barrier bw high and low culture, no longer vertical representation culture, hierarchy with good/bas quality, complete collapse of these differences. Even a form of celebration/veneration of popular and low culture.

G. Urry: “Almost anything can become an object of curiosity for visitors.” No longer a need for a monument/a museum to be particularly well rated for