Acton, ACT: ANU Press, 2016. xix, 457 pp. (Illustrations.) Free, eBook: https://press.anu.edu.au/publications/touring-pacific-cultures. ISBN 978-1-922144-26-3.
Tourism is as old as empire. The wealthy and privileged ventured from cities in Greece and Rome to country and seaside retreats, seeking escape from the “modern” ills of city life and looking for the chance to experience how “common” folk lived. However, as empires collapsed, so too did tourism, temporarily. Later, a new kind of tourism emerged as pilgrims set off on religious jaunts to renowned sites, with organizers ensuring the pilgrims were well housed and fed along the way. The rise of empires again set off a new flush of tourists seeking health and education. Spas and health clinics sprang up to cater to the wealthy in search of tonics to cure eighteenth-century ailments. The English privileged classes embarked upon “The Grand Tour” so as to improve their education abroad and to alleviate boredom at home. But it was in the wake of the Industrial Revolution that leisure tourism, as we know it today, enabled middle-class adventurers to travel beyond home shores. This movement has only recently beckoned the curious gaze of academics.
Touring Pacific Cultures is a welcome contribution to the growing discourse(s) commenting on the relative value of a tourism industry heavily dominated by a travelling Western population arriving at the home shores of underprivileged, colonial survivors. In the case of this ebook, the author’s gaze is trained upon the Pacific and its population’s long-suffering relations with “invaders,” both as colonizers and now as tourists.
The contributions to this volume range from poetic engagements to nostalgic recollections and investigative encounters. However, that tells one little of the depth of textural enquiry and reflection presented in this compilation. The editors begin with an exploration of the many issues that cause us, as social scientists, to cringe at the very thought of tourism and its impact upon Pacific Islanders: “colonialism and tourism have intersected to both undermine and appropriate indigenous forms of cultural identity … the analysis of such violent appropriations and erasures comprises a key feature of this volume” (15–16). Although there are a few benefits, it is suggested, that may accompany touristic encounters, these are inevitably swamped by the ferocious onslaught of mass tourism and its associated evils. The editors recognize the vastly complex subject matter, with its many threads of discourse and intricate array of interactions; however, it is difficult to escape the overall message that visitors are aggressors and those visited their victims.
There are far too many excellent contributions (31!) to realistically deal with them individually. However, identifying a few relevant themes may help to engender a sense of the breadth of “encounters” told. One recurring topic is imagery creation. Designed to lure tourists with promised encounters in “paradise” and a primitive past that includes cannibals on the one hand and alluring maidens on the other, imagery construction is like the evil queen’s magic mirror, reflecting what tourists desire while failing to reveal the realities of an underprivileged population living in a poverty-stricken Pacific “paradise.” Promotional imagery suggests opportunities for interactions with the exotic “other,” beaming welcoming smiles under azure-blue skies, creating fantasies it is ultimately unable to fulfil (Lindstrom, Tamaira, Taylor, Banivanua Mar, Alexeyeff, Connell). Related to image construction is the voice of agency. Whose are the voices engaged in image construction (Lindstrom, Amoamo, Treagus, Tamaira, Jolly, Phipps, Banivanua Mar, Taylor) and, how do these colour the expectations of tourists on their Pacific voyages (Steel, Amoamo, Banivanua Mar, MacCarthy, Cox, Lee, Alexeyeff, Connell)? In the contributions to this volume these questions are too often skewed towards a subliminal cringe. More overtly, the current of criticism demonizes the industry and its participants. Although the promises implied may be illusory and the deleterious effects of tourism cannot be denied, there is room to think in new ways and suggest a different form of image construction.
The commodification of culture is another overwhelming theme. While not a new one, it continues to draw intellectual scrutiny here (Taylor and Alexeyeff, Treagus, Jolly, Phipps, Taylor). What is more interesting, however, is the agency demonstrated by locals and their desire to both attract tourists as well as manage the interactions and representations in their own terms (Amoamo, Tamaira, Jolly, Banivanua Mar, MacCarthy, Cox, Lee). Performing culture is likewise a potent motif, laden with questions of agency, authenticity, and the tourist and local gaze (Treagus, Jolly, Phipps, Teaiwa and Vile, Cox).
There is so much to recommend this ebook to readers interested in tourism studies. However, the issues raised, while real, are not new. What can we learn about tourism and its impact that moves us beyond what is depicted in these pages? Is there another lens to look through, beyond the one focussing on the ills of tourism? Rather than continuing what is in many ways a nostalgic gaze upon the loss of culture, cultural autonomy, and agency, which is argued to be under assault by mass tourism, consideration of the benefits of tourism may lead to a new way of thinking about and, ultimately, managing tourism. Perhaps the best contribution for me in this volume is that provided by Jane Desmond. While the author recognizes the well-documented downfalls associated with mass tourism, she suggests alternative ways to manage and view tourism in the Pacific. We are all too familiar with the trope that casts tourism as an exploitative operation, but there are experiences that suggest other considerations as well. It is to these possibilities that I hope future enquiry turns.
Shirley Campbell
Australian National University, Canberra, Australia
pp. 211-212