Why is the tourist gaze important?

Why is the tourist gaze important?

What exactly is the gaze? Accepting the fundamental visual nature of many tourism experiences, Urry and Larsen (p. 14) offer, ‘Gazes organise the encounters of visitors with the “other”, providing some sense of competence, pleasure and structure to those experiences’.

What is the collective gaze?

The collective gaze is looking for events, amusement facilities and the presence of many other tourists: “Other people give atmos- phere or a sense of carnival to a place” (Urry 1990, 45f.). Hans Magnus Enzensber- ger analyses this gaze seeing tourism as an industrially organised escape from the industrial world.

What is the meaning of tourist gaze?

The tourist gaze refers to the idea that tourists’ ways of seeing places and people and the selection of those sights is directed and organised by the tourism industry.

What did the tourist gaze at?

The “tourist gaze” is explained by sociologist John Urry as the set of expectations that tourists place on local populations when they participate in heritage tourism, in the search for having an “authentic” experience.

What is meant by tourist gaze?

What is tourism commodification?

In terms of tourism, presentation of local values such as local traditions, rituals, festivals, or handicrafts causes the commodification (Gotham, 2002; Mbaiwa, 2011). Local values presented to tourism experience are commoditized by mechanic and social reproduction.

What is the connotation of gaze?

To gaze is to look steadily and intently at something, especially at that which excites admiration, curiosity, or interest: to gaze at scenery, at a scientific experiment. To stare is to gaze with eyes wide open, as from surprise, wonder, alarm, stupidity, or impertinence: to stare unbelievingly or rudely.

What is staged authenticity in tourism?

What is staged authenticity? Staged authenticity is essentially a cultural practice, event or activity that is ‘staged’ for the purpose of the tourists. It could be that this is an outdated practice or that it has been modified for the purpose of tourism.

Is tourism a commodity?

Tourism as a complex sociocultural dimension of modernity is subject to the same general principles of capitalist consumer culture. The paper interprets tourism as commodity and seeks to give meaningful content to some theoretical ideas latent in tourism research.

How is tourism related to the tourist gaze?

Central to notion of the tourist gaze is the idea that our desires to visit places and the way we experience those places are not simply individual and autonomous but are socially organised, and therefore changes in tourism are related to wider transformations in society.

Is the tourist gaze by John Urry still relevant?

The ideas developed by Urry are still widely quoted and relevant today but a major criticism of his work is that too much emphasis is placed on the visual aspects of being a tourist rather than the whole experience. This essay will investigate this claim before concluding whether or not this is the case.

Where did the mass tourist gaze take place?

It is worth repeating here the quotes above: ‘The mass tourist gaze was initiated in the backstreets of the industrial towns and cities in the north of England.’ This reflects Urry’s view that a tourist place is ‘constructed in relationship to its opposite, to non-tourist forms of social experience and consciousness’ (Second edition p. 31).

How is the tourist gaze constructed in Paris?

8 The gaze is constructed through signs, and tourism involves the collection of signs. When tourists see two people kissing in Paris what they capture in the gaze is ‘timeless romantic Paris’. When a small village in England is seen, what they gaze oldeupon is the ‘real England’.