THE TRAVELING SEMINAR: AN EXPERIMENT IN CROSS-CULTURAL TOURISM AND EDUCATION IN TAIWAN

T H E T R AV E L I N G S E M I N A R : A N E X P E R I M E N T I N

C R O S S - C U LT U R A L T O U R I S M A N D E D U CAT I O N

I N TA I WA N

D AV I D B L U N D E L L

National Chengchi University

This article explores the anthropologist’s role in facilitating and guiding inter-national educational traveling seminars through interaction with local people,based on my experiences with such seminars in Taiwan. Since the late 1980s, theTaiwanese authorities have reviewed restricted space, converting it into scenic areasand national parks. Martial law was lifted, allowing for changes in the society andintroducing a “green” consciousness concerned with examining local roots. In 1992,a method of tourism was developed in which the participants of traveling seminarsvisited places in Taiwan or other world locations expecting to (1) explore, (2) learn,(3) interact, (4) respect, (5) share qualitative feedback with one another, and (6)enjoy the process. When addressing a topic for discussion, such as cultural heritageor the environment, each member of such traveling seminars speaks in his or herown language to share with the group. That is to say, participants explore throughtravel as a learning process, interacting with others with concern and respect fordifferences, sharing experiences, and conversing in their mother tongues with trans-lation assistance. Key Words: traveling seminar, Taiwan, ecotourism, hosts andguests, international education

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My objective in this paper is to show how participation in an eco-culturaltourism project is a significant means by which anthropologists can influencethe way tourists and hosts perceive themselves, the environment, and one an-other. The Taiwan traveling seminar project, a unique tour that was developedin for a visit by the humanist psychologist Jean Houston, works because

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234 n a p a B u l l e t i n 2 3 / T h e Tr a v e l i n g S e m i n a r

the participants are both hosts and guests and meet one another on the neutralground of the tour. My current opinion of the value of the seminar resultedfrom looking at the participation of “seminar members,” both en route and atdestinations, from the etic (expert) and emic (local) points of view.

These traveling seminars are organized for the participants to share knowl-edge on an egalitarian basis in order to () explore, () learn, () interact, ()respect, () share qualitative feedback with one another, and () enjoy theprocess. They learn while traveling, interacting among themselves and withlocal people, thereby developing concern and respect for differences throughcross-cultural and interpersonal sharing. What is unique about this process ofconducting a traveling seminar is the dialogue between the tourists, which takesplace in each participant’s own language. The resulting process of educationoccurs over several days, as people in the tour learn about the culture, nature,and heritage they witness through interaction with local people and expertguides within the natural environment. Members of the traveling seminar areencouraged to speak in their own languages and to share their thoughts onthe topic of discussion with the group. In this way, both visitors and thosevisited interact among themselves and with one another in order to learn. Theoutcome is a touring, open classroom without walls.

T H E F I E L D O F V I S I T I N G F O R E D U C AT I O N

The first step in developing a multilingual traveling seminar is researchingpossible itineraries through consultation with potential participants. For ourinitial seminars, the Institute of Cultural Affairs, Taiwan, held meetings forpeople who were interested in visiting a place with a team of like-mindedpeople, academics, and local experts. These individuals told us they expectedthe traveling seminar to let them experience and learn from something differentfrom their daily lives. In general, participants want to be taken out of their usualroutines and into a different physical place, preferably a rural or mountainousenvironment that is considered relatively inaccessible. Once people visit suchplaces, however, they often wonder why they could not have gone there ontheir own. When tourists ask this question, our usual response is that it’s aneffort to take off and explore and that people need a logistical network beforetaking that first step.

The participants’ desire to experience “natural” and “ethnic” aspectsof the environment led us to produce the phrase “eco-cultural traveling

n a p a B u l l e t i n 2 3 / T h e Tr a v e l i n g S e m i n a r 235

seminar or tour.” We then asked bio-naturalists, geologists, ethnologists,anthropologists—including linguists—and professional recreational special-ists to join the tour as specialists who could explain what was “natural” and“ethnic.” In the resulting tours, about two-thirds of the participants have beenthose with a similar interest in “getting away and seeing the world, led byacademics and outdoor professionals,” and a third have been bio-naturalists,geologists, ethnologists, and local historians. Each traveling seminar has focusedon a topic to explore. This topic might be the mountain regions of southernTaiwan, where the Rukai people have almost abandoned their stacked, slatehouses on high ridges, or the coastal environs of the Amis people, where el-ders at Malan Village, Taitung, produced the vocal theme for the AtlantaOlympic Games (see Anderson ).

Cultural tourism is about sharing and learning the local heritage of a peoplewhile traveling among them and staying in their homes. Cultural tourism’seducational goals are based on an appreciation of cultures and on cultural con-servation (Walle ). Ecotourism offers similar expectations in the context ofa pristine natural environment. Travelers to such places, and their inhabitants,are uniquely aware of an ecosystem’s need for equilibrium (see Whelan ).This tandem understanding implies an orientation toward visiting that con-cerns the ethics of getting to know the inhabitants of an ecosystem in placeswhere environmental and cultural conservation are working and open to beobserved.

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The human organism . . . is . . . motivated to keep the influx of novelty, com-plexity, and information within an optimal range and thus escape the extremesof confusion (This is Tuesday, so it must be Belgium) and boredom (We nevergo anywhere!). [Berlyne :]

I call our tour a “traveling seminar” or an “eco-cultural tour.” It is imbuedwith symbols and meanings affecting human life as a meaningful pilgrim-age (Graburn ). The traveling format for cross-cultural and interpersonalunderstanding was first developed under the auspices of the Institute of Cul-tural Affairs, Taiwan, for the visit of Jean Houston, a psychologist whoconducts journeys into the origins of human consciousness through pathwaysof mythology. Over the years since, I have arranged traveling seminars with avolunteer team and led tours, primarily for people to explore Taiwan, but also


to places such as Siberia and Sri Lanka. A special feature of the eco-cultural,traveling tour is that we provide a structure so that all the participants andlocal hosts can, in their own native languages, communicate and reflect ontheir tour experience. We have taken care to support an information net-work among all the different language speakers as part of the sharing processthroughout the tour. I believe this tour characteristic is unique in the practice oftourism, yet common in spiritual studies, witnessing, and group psychologicaltherapy.

Traveling seminars begin with acquaintance-building and informationalgatherings held in Taipei, the capital and an urban basin in northern Taiwan,by the Institute of Cultural Affairs. Each potential participant is asked tointroduce himself or herself and to discuss expectations for a possible travelingseminar, including the route and content. A group of volunteers is selectedfrom the gathering to take responsibility for researching sites and routes. Aspeople sign up, more orientation meetings are held to conduct further researchinto people’s expectations. The scouts, usually myself and others, will thenconduct a pre-tour to arrange an infrastructure that is uniquely applicable tothe tour’s concept. We meet with local people to discuss a route, stops, andplaces to stay.

The first announcement for a traveling seminar was conveyed by word ofmouth. Once several people had agreed to call for a meeting, we gathered atthe home of a mutual friend to discuss the theme of our tour. The Instituteof Cultural Affairs then sent interested people a notice by e-mail, fax, andpost. I then made a two-day, pre-tour experimental run, meeting local peoplealong the route to ask them about the possibility of returning several weeksor months later with – or – people. This required the first round ofcommunication to explain what a traveling seminar was about, and to localsat contact points who expressed curiosity about such a plan and interest inits educational outcome. Once back in Taipei, I again called a gathering ofthe eco-cultural participants to further discuss the route and to share pictures.Eventually, a date was set for the three-day tour to begin and the participantsbegan to prepare themselves for it.

The multilingual, multiethnic aspects of the traveling seminar enhancedthe educational process of the initial tour. The delivery of comments in theparticipants’ languages of choice required translation and interpretation. Ourwinding path into the mountains led us to see how a temple is built andhow a garden is planted, and communing with other people through differ-ent languages provided a sense of intimacy despite the participants’ separate


perspectives. We as travelers were also very concerned about the tour’s impacton our hosts, the environment, and ourselves. We were careful not just totake only pictures and leave only footprints, but to reach out and embrace theencounter with local people based on friendship.

C U LT U R A L A N T H R O P O L O G I C A L O R I E N TAT I O N F O R T H E

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In anthropology, it is known that the past is a scarce resource (Appadurai), making the notion of heritage a rich item or complex system in thepresent—important as a marker of, by, and for the local people. This heritageis often based on a fragile and eroding environment that has succumbed toindustrialization. Once heritage has been recognized and established as a matterof record for the world to observe, the next step is to open the doors for thepublic to take notice and visit sites they have previously only read about.

For an anthropologist cum guide, the traveling course is about partakingin the experience of taking mental notes or writing notes from the partici-pants’ conversations en route, and managing the tour in order to bring peo-ple together. Our experiment in an eco-cultural traveling seminar has nowtaken place regularly over the past ten years. The groups have been composedof Taiwanese, North Americans, Europeans, and nationalities throughoutAsia.

For the most part, the people in these tour groups, as well as the oth-ers encountered along the way, have been strangers to one another. Duringencounters that include natural terrain, flora and fauna, food, cultural andpersonal social norms, and memories, the participants reflect and share withone another. Each person is considered responsible for contributing and shar-ing thoughts about the encounter. The people who make the journey havemade the choice to attend preparatory meetings, to read on the topic, and toparticipate with interest.

Participants in the initial traveling seminar thought it was best to havediversity among the attendees in terms of age and socio-economic background.Students, the elderly, and children were encouraged to participate to enhancethe experience for all participants. When people called the Institute of CulturalAffairs or came to meetings and expressed interest in participating in a tour butstated that they could not afford the set fees, the tour group reduced registrationfees for them.


F I G U R E 1 . At Tzushr Temple (founded in ) at Sanshia (ThreeGorges of Taipei County), Dr. Blundell points out wood and stonecarvings in the architecture.

H O W T H E F I R S T A N T H R O P O L O G I C A L T R AV E L I N G S E M I N A R

T O O K P L AC E I N TA I WA N

No relationship significantly entered can ever end—the trouble is with significantentry. [Cooper :]

As Jean Houston was planning her visit to Taiwan, a coordinator at theInstitute of Cultural Affairs, Jo Tai, asked me to arrange a traveling seminarattended by local and international participants to explore the layers of theisland’s cultures. After careful consideration, I designed a three-day tour.

To make the arrangements, I had to convince local people that Dr. Houstonwould be interested in sharing indigenous knowledge from Taiwan’s prehistoryand early history with the other participants. At the time, most local people inTaipei thought that Dr. Houston would only want to reflect on Buddhist andTaoist heritage. I explained that Taiwan was unique because of its indigenousorigins and resulting traditions, and that Dr. Houston would be interested inunfolding this heritage to the participants. The Institute of Cultural Affairswas supportive of my idea, but other co-organizers were sure I was wrong. Iexplained that, having read Houston’s books, I knew indigenous knowledgeto be an important component of her teachings. I invited an ethnologist,


Professor Bien Chiang, to explain the worth and value of indigenous knowl-edge, as the Taiwanese seemed to be expressing their roots in terms of thereligious origins based on Han Chinese culture. I designed a route that wouldinclude both the prehistoric origins of culture and the Han Chinese roots trans-planted from the mainland four hundred years ago as a living matrix of thecontemporary life in Taiwan.

In preparation, I drove to the east coast of Taiwan to visit the newly estab-lished office of National East Coast Scenic Area administrators. Since I hadworked for the establishment of the National Museum of Prehistory along theeast coast, I was able to select archaeological sites as stops for the seminar. Oneof these sites was the Paleolithic “Caves of the Eight Immortals” (Pahsientung)dating back long before the Neolithic cultures. It is now thought that the sitescould date back , years. The highway had been widened farther southalong the coast, where Neolithic sites were exposed. I decided the road cutwould be another stop to observe the strata of pottery and worked slate andTaiwan jade (nephrite). The road continued to Taitung, a county where sixAustronesian-speaking indigenous groups reside. I made arrangements to stayat a site near natural thermal springs.

The next day I went to Santimen in the southern central range, where theindigenous Formosan Austronesian-speaking Rukai and Paiwan share ground.The people were receptive to a home stay arrangement and dinner party tocelebrate their cultures with the participants. I also made arrangements to meetwith Han Chinese Hakka heritage leadership on the hillsides of the plains inJo Tai’s home region of Meinung in Pingtung County. This community ofHakka speakers was important to both indigenous people and Min-nan HanChinese immigrants from Fujian in terms of its association with cultural andtrading interactions.

Then I decided that further exploration was required to understand thedescendants of Chinese immigrants. Thus I included the old ruling town ofTainan, the seat of power under Dutch Formosa (–) and the Ch’ing(Qing) dynasty until the s—when the first governor was appointed to thenewly formed province and the capital was moved to Taipei—and Tachia, anancient harbor dedicated to the sea deity Matsu (Empress of Heaven) at theestuary of the Ta-an River, where early Han Chinese settlers built a town facingthe Taiwan Strait.

Eventually, the itinerary was outlined and I headed back to Taipei to presentmy findings to the institute. The itinerary was accepted, and I then began toplan the logistics of the trip. Below is a map of the tour route, followed by a list


F I G U R E 2 . Map of Taiwan showing the course of the first eco-cultural traveling seminar.


of the steps I took to make the first eco-cultural tour or traveling seminar areality.

� Negotiated among interested parties to determine what was importantto include on the route.

� Envisioned a route that would suit the seminar’s intention.� Scouted the way by vehicle as a pre-tour, negotiating with local people

along the way for a route that included meals, accommodation, reststops, and sites or venues for lectures and reflections.

� Figured the cost of the tour, including transportation fees of vehiclesand other expenses, based on the negotiations of the pre-tour.

� Invited co-speakers and local people to participate.� Announced the traveling seminar’s route and costs through newsletters

or broadcasts from the host institution to possible participants.� Gathered the prospective candidates for the seminar to discuss the

route, costs, and conditions.� Oversaw the tour logistics—accounting, transportation,

accommodation, food and drink, honoraria for guest speakers, pre-tourexpenses, venue costs, administration by the institution, and otherminor expenses—and determined the cost of the seminar for eachindividual. Discounts applied for those who registered early, children,students, the elderly, and others whose needs were deemed valid by theinstitution.

The traveling seminar is a not-for-profit enterprise, and the fees assessedare only to recover the basic costs. If a surplus arises, the participants meet todiscuss whether to refund the excess money or to save it for future activities.After the first traveling seminar, the participants decided that the seminarshould operate as a “club for education” since it is founded on local knowledgeand professional research. Later in the life of the program, participants beganto gather periodically at the residence of Jo Tai and T. B. Sung to reflect on theirexperiences and plan future seminars. Eventually, the group became a bit moreinstitutionalized. The group includes the following basic member components:

. Institute managers work from an office or home to receive calls,circulate and post notices in journals and other media, host gatherings,and account for expenses.

. A designated person coordinates the tour by planning the travelingseminar theme and route and actively engaging the group prior to andduring the seminar.


. The key coordinator selects lecturers for the traveling seminar based ontheir expertise with regard to the theme of the tour. Some lecturerstravel with the group; others are on location to receive the group at adestination.

. Participants include all those who attend the seminar to share andlearn—both those who travel to each destination and those who areposted at each destination to interact with others.

Gradually a group of volunteers was formed to take responsibility for re-searching sites in Taiwan and to conduct and document traveling seminars. Asthey began, a plan emerged to continue tour development and hosting throughan association with the Institute of Cultural Affairs. This was established asthe Eco-Cultural Tour Association (ECTA) as an initial organization.

A N O U T L I N E O F T H E F I R S T T H R E E - DAY T R AV E L I N G S E M I N A R

W I T H D R . J E A N H O U S T O N

In my role as an anthropologist, I worked as an organizer and shared lecturingwith Dr. Houston, who gave a philosophical grand view of humanity. In mylectures, I applied contextual, firsthand knowledge of the archaeology of thesites from Paleolithic and Neolithic cultures in prehistory, the ethnology ofindigenous cultures, and the current state of Taoist–Buddhist religions in theethnographic present for Taiwan (see Blundell , , ; Chambers; Hsieh ; Tai and Blundell ). What follows is an outline of thefirst three-day, eco-cultural traveling seminar, which has served as the modelfor subsequent seminars.

Day One

We began the tour by train on a journey to the east coast, where the groupvisited the hospital and medical training facility of Ven. Cheng Yen, a Buddhistnun who founded the Tzu Chi (Ciji) Foundation in Hualien. People weredeeply moved by the caring staff and the hospital’s volunteer network, whichincludes several million supporters across the island. Based on the experience,one person remarked that it was impossible to think of Taiwanese as selfish orgreedy. From this point, we proceeded by bus to the sacred shrines of Kuan Yin.Next we visited the ancient Caves of the Eight Immortals (Pahsientung) onthe Pacific coast, once inhabited by Paleolithic ancestors. Dr. Houston led the


F I G U R E 3 . Caves of the Eight Immortals (Pahsientung) with Dr. JeanHouston and participants.

imagining of what it must have been like to live in Taiwan when the ancestorswho first called this place home inhabited the caves. Heading farther south, thegroup visited archaeological sites representing Neolithic cultures. The eveningwas spent at a thermal spring resort at Chih-pen Valley, Taitung.

Day Two

The second day continued the journey into the southern region, travelingwest up and across the south central mountains into Pingtung County andits distinctive Hakka villages and farms in Meinung. The local people treatedthe group to their culture, cuisine, and history, including a tour of a memoriallibrary dedicated to Jong Li-ho, one of the most influential Hakka writers ofthe th century. From there, the group traveled to the indigenous mountaincommunities of Santimen, where members of the Paiwan and Rukai welcomedparticipants for an amazing evening of eating, dancing, and listening to legends.The group members stayed in local homes as overnight guests.

Day Three

The third day of the seminar was a journey to the southwestern region—a visitto the “supermarket of the underworld.” The Tung Yueh-dien (a Taoist temple)in Tainan gave everyone a chance to experience firsthand the diversity of local


F I G U R E 4 . Rukai village leader explains the community’s heritage.

beliefs and practices relating to the netherworld. The group was privileged to bepresent at powerful scenes in which local priests guided trances, presided overthe posthumous wedding of a young woman, and facilitated a conversationbetween a dead son and his mother.

After a downpour of flooding rain, the group moved north along the westerncoast to visit the old harbor at Ta-an. As the sun set into the Taiwan Strait, theparticipants sat in a circle and Dr. Houston led a reflection on the last threedays’ diversity of experiences. Each person in the circle in turn reflected backto the group. Afterwards, the group visited the Tachia Temple of Matsu (SeaGoddess and Empress of Heaven). The group members were empowered bytheir real, evident ability to travel and to tour the island as a collective.

C O N C L U S I O N S

Each traveling experience employs both experts in specific fields, who presentinformation, and seminar specialists, who facilitate the educational process,


F I G U R E 5 . Rukai host prepares breakfast for the traveling seminar group at themountain stone village of Kochapogan in the vicinity of Santimen.

allowing participants to travel together and explore the ecology and localenvironment with experienced guides. The local hosts en route share their wayof life through an afternoon visit or an overnight stay. And the translators thataccompany the tours are able to convey what each person has said, giving par-ticipants and leaders the opportunity to lead the discussion and effectively com-municate their points of view. Thus, the learning process is active, not passive.

The first eco-cultural traveling seminar happened to occur a few years afterthe lifting of martial law in Taiwan, and matched the growth of a “green”consciousness that promoted indigenous and ethnic revival at the grass roots.City folk gathered for our tour to encounter the “simple life.” Local peoplejoined the group en route. The Taiwan Institute of Cultural Affairs modeleda program in which the urban participants (who were roving off their beatentrack) demonstrated an attitude of respect for those they met in rural areas. Theroute also included possibilities for the establishment of local world heritagesites, from a mountain ridge with an almost abandoned Rukai stone villagein Pingtung County to a primeval grove of giant cypress in a perpetuallymisty valley. Experts from the university on geomorphology, timber, fauna,and ethnology accompanied the tour to enter the conversations at hand.

The basic structure of the traveling seminar can serve as a replicable model,but tour specifics will vary according to the countries in which they occur and


the places to be visited. Each traveling seminar depends on a loose yet cohesivegathering of people committed to working together for a mutually beneficiallearning experience composed of changing landscapes and conversations withstrangers who are knowledge-sharers and potential friends. Frequent meetingsfor interpersonal exchange and discussion of the tour content are required forthe sustainability of the process. This model, with its localized sustainability,could be employed in any community where people embrace the concept thatreflective education through travel-based sharing is a valuable, eye-openingresource and experience.

For an individual or a tour group, the empowerment of travel lies in its op-portunities for connecting with a global trend of affluence. In Valene Smith’spioneering work, Hosts and Guests: The Anthropology of Tourism (), she in-troduces tourism as a major factor in economic growth worldwide. Of course,our informal traveling group is an aspect of globalization in a world of contend-ing perspectives on what life means (see Langness ; Morrow ; Wu ;Barber ; Bauman ; Held et al. ; Friedman , ; Webster, ). Both hosts and guests consider their roles to be part of an inter-national trend in growing awareness. In the introduction to her book, Smithstates that tourism can be classified as exotic tourism, cultural tourism, heritagetourism, environmental tourism, and recreational tourism (Smith :–).Again, our traveling seminar, as an eco-cultural tour, includes environmentalelements as well as exotic, cultural, and heritage elements, depending on thetheme of the tour. Some participants have mentioned that regardless of thetheme, the outing is also recreational, or simply a way to get some fresh air anda break from the daily routine. When I studied pilgrimage in Sri Lanka (seeBlundell :–), I found that the Sinhalese villagers connected withone another through the stream of people visiting the sacred shrines, and inturn connected with the respect felt for their deity. People with the ability totravel seek to connect with something greater than what they usually do.

The ethos for this type of travel rests in a “charter” of mutualization throughinteraction that inspires participatory commitment. Through immersion inthe local people’s way of life, tourists come to have an ecological sense ofplace and people. Interactive events in daily life encourage participants toshare their own experiences and interests while learning from one anotherand the experts on the tour. This combination of activities tends to build asense of respect for diverse lifestyles. The tours also involve many acceptedexperts on local societies and cultures as well as geography, linguistics, ecology


and other arenas of academic exploration. The past tours have involved manyorganizations, both public and private. Volunteers gave of their own expertiseand time to bring a new reality of understanding of the locations to the groupparticipants.

Sustainability of our tour encounters is our mutual goal for a common future(See Wahab and Pigram ; Hall and Lew ; Butler ; Aronsson ;Cheung ). In three days, we cannot expect fully to grasp other realities,yet accepting sustainability of the life cycle (Cooper :) as a guidingresource for global interaction and the managing principle for continuance ofrelationships has become the ethos of the program. It is indeed our view that firstencounters should be the beginnings of relationships in other places. Therefore,our tacit understanding has been that we address our hosts in friendship, whoin turn treat us as personal guests. The hosts may then be invited by the gueststo be personal guests at their own homes in the future. Thus the seminarbecomes the impetus for the reciprocation of hosting or a reunion of hosts andguests on an individual basis.

Eco-cultural tours have taken off in Taiwan, although my colleagues in theforestry department at the university where I have taught would say that it isn’teco-tourism, since that’s about visiting pristine nature. Once you add cultural toeco-, then you have another species. Yet both types of tourism rely on a faithfuland respectful coming together with the “other”: a caring tourism. This caringaspect is the tour’s draw, especially since the participants can rely on using theirnative languages to share and express heartfelt reflections on their experiences.I believe that the eco-cultural seminars work for cross-cultural and ecologicalunderstanding. Even though the tour participants who come as guests have theaffluence and leisure time to partake in this kind of education, the Instituteof Cultural Affairs is interested in having economically disadvantaged peopleshare in the experience as well by conducting the not-for-profit tours. The hostsalso learn from the experience of this cultural cross-fertilization and “green”education. The most important keys of success for these activities are to haveaware, responsible, and interested people who will share and articulate theirpersonal and cultural observations as traveling seminar participants, hosts,and guests, in an ethos of living, interrelated friendship. The centerpiece ofeco-cultural travel is this vital dialogue, which builds lasting, cross-culturalfriendships.

D e d i c a t e d t o J o Ta i


N O T E S

. Jean Houston, a student of Joseph Campbell and the “adopted daughter” of Margaret Mead,is a leader of the human potential movement in the United States. More than twenty years ago, Dr.Houston founded the Mystery School, which is dedicated to the process of self-discovery throughcross-cultural studies. Jean Houston conducts transformational workshops and seminars drawing onthe strength of legendary and indigenous knowledge. See her works A Mythic Life, ; The PossibleHuman, ; and Evolution, .

. The Institute of Cultural Affairs is a consultant to the United Nations registered as a self-sustaining office providing services that envision heritage as a resource for the future. The institute isa unique, global organization of people who care for the human factor in world development. Thisinternational yet locally based institute facilitates a process of constructive change in which individualsdedicated to practical problem-solving use their knowledge of policy and development methods toimprove the lives of local participants based on their aspirations and vision of life.

. A note of appreciation: I offer my heartfelt thanks to Tim Wallace for prompting this articleon a traveling seminar as an example of practicing anthropology for public education. I would like tothank Renee Wolcott for her copyediting talents, Hsuing-ming Liao for creating the map of Taiwan,and the staff at the University of California Press. Hui-ji Wang, Betty Rothenberger, and Christian A.Anderson also assisted by making suggestions for the final draft.

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THE TRAVELING SEMINAR: AN EXPERIMENT IN CROSS-CULTURAL TOURISM AND EDUCATION IN TAIWAN

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