Anthropology contribution in tourism

What does anthropology contribute to tourism? By Ghylaine Meukeu 2015

What does anthropology contribute to tourism?

Introduction

Anthropology can be defined as a scientific study of the origin, the behavior, and the physical, social, and cultural development of humans. So, the task of an anthropologist is to try to understand what makes us human by studying human ancestors through archaeological excavation and by observing living cultures throughout the world. By the end of twentieth century, Anthropologists start to be shown few interests in the anthropology of tourism. But now, there are more and more anthropologists who orient their researches on tourists. The first reason which could explain this infatuation is the fact that, tourism often involves face-to-face encounters between people of different cultural backgrounds. Tazim Jamal and Mike Robinson said in The sage handbook of tourism studies “Anthropology which is the study of human life a unique way of knowing, an overarching disciplinary perspective that foregrounds ethnographic research and holistic analysis” in . The other reason is the economical value. In fact, last year, there were

- Over 1 billion “international arrivals” worldwide - Receipts over 850 billon USD - Infrastructure valued over 3 trillion USD

That represents a huge amount of money and jobs. Then, follow other reasons such as political, environmental and socio-cultural. The purpose of anthropology in tourism is to try to understand in one side, the origin of tourism by being focused on tourists and in another side the impact of tourism on local people, by using a critical approach. So, what the contribution of anthropology to tourism? We will look into this issue in this paper.


Hypothesis

Anthropologists and tourists might have a lot in common. Both spend time exploring the cultural aspects, rituals of society, and both carry the status of “stranger” as they make incursion into other people‘s lives. Several factors make tourism especially relevant to anthropology. First of all, tourism occur human societies. Almost every part in the world has been discovered and shared at the global level thanks to Internet (social networks). So, to conduct an anthropological study, an anthropologist has to spend at least one year in the field to collecting data. The problem with this technique in tourism is the fact that, tourism demand is fluid, people are guided by the trends of the global word. So, Anthropology is using Ethnography , which does not require too long to conduct a study. The ethnographer can go more times to a tourist destination as a tourist or as a tour guide, as a translator… and used the EMIC perspective (participant observation), being an “insider” in order to understand the motivations, behavior and experiences of tourists, who decide to visit a particular place. That can be a better way to understand and respond to the demand on the market. So, by using stereotypes of authenticity to attract more and more tourists. Because nowadays, authenticity is what we are taking as authentic for us. As we can see on the picture below, this girls performing by wearing strange assessors, which might attract tourists interested to see them performing, and called it “authentic life or culture of these people”. Maybe in their everyday life they are not wearing this kind of fancy.

The ethnographer can also use the vertical ethnography which consist in “ Providing close-grained analyses of how a single site is connected locally,


nationally, regionally and globally Multitude of other forms of representation besides fieldwork: Archival research, the analysis of public discourse, interviewing, journalism, fiction or statistical representations of collectivities multitemporal (longitudinal or historical)dimension”, Dr. Noel B. Salazar. The ethnographer uses the EMIC perspective for the local community, first of all in order to evaluate the damage caused by the tourist arrivals in that community. But also in order to understand the hostility or reject of tourists by some local communities (conservatory of their customs, benefit from tourism is only for foreigners, bad use of natural resources, illegal sexual tourism…). For example in an Islamic community, women have to cover all them body or they might be injured by local community who could be shocked by western women dresses; when there is a hot weather. We have to underline the fact that, when tourists and locals come together, both have the opportunity not only to have a glimpse at others live, but also to reflect on their own lives due to the contact with others. These cultural exchange could be one of the keys of “gocal” culture (for example: souvenirs). As a result, these cross-cultural interactions sometimes suggest other to perform their own “day’s life”. As Dean McCannon said about authenticity: every culture has its “ front and back stage”. What is easier to show to other is the “front” stage… Culture is like an iceberg and in tourism, tourism stakeholders tend to hide what they think, it should not be appreciated by tourists.

So, tourism is using anthropology through ethnography to understand motivations of a tourist by performing as a tourist, it might be easier to keep in touch with other tourists and learn more about their expectations.


Similarities and differences

By going deeper in the psychology of the tourism, an anthropologist who is working in tourism, can propose new sustainable ways or tools for the promotion of the tourism. First of all how to formulate the offer called “pre-tour”; every trip has three parts (cfr. The mind of traveler, Eric J. Leed) his “pre-tour” is about motivation of visitation a specific place, after we have the trip which is not an important phase and finally we have the arrival which involves the contact with others (local communities) and services offered. So, a seller of travel packages should find how to push people to visit a place (for example Tanzania which promoting itself as the “ authentic Africa” with animals and the Massai tribe; because of stereotypes which pint Africa as an “exotic” continent to western tourists (tourist lens). So, western tourists might have only this image of Tanzania. As we know, tourism is about dream, illusions and travel agencies are offering a promise of this dream comes true. For example on the picture below take from a travel agency website, we can see tourists and tourist guide very close to lions. So, this travel agency is giving you the promise of being closer to lions. The travel agency is saying:”we have signed up an agreement with lions, they will be expecting you there”. That promise cannot be feasible because of the fact that lions are animals, they are moving a lot in park and they are dangerous.


Anthropology is also important in how to limit the socio-economic impact due to the tourist arrivals. That means the benefit of the local communities from tourism as a stakeholder and the preservation or limitation of natural and cultural damages.


SOCIO -CULTURAL IMPACTS

Figure 1 Dr. Noel B. Salazar slide

Conclusion

Reaching the end of our paper, we can say that: anthropology in tourism is considering tourism as a “system” which has many components called “stakeholders” (the Government, tour operators, travel agencies, accommodation providers, local communities, IT, investors, NGOs…) . These components have to be looked into very carefully in order to understand how to manage each part of the system for the purpose of preserving the harmony in the system. To do so, Anthropology through ethnography is conducting studies for the aim to describe, interpret, and analyzes every characteristic, structure and interaction related to a socio-cultural group. So, we could say that anthropology is not just helping tourism in promotion, but also it is giving advices to the stakeholders for a sustainable tourism because natural recourses are irreplaceable. However we are asking the question what should be the future of anthropology of tourism in the global WORLD ?

Anthropology contribution in tourism

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