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Anthropology of tourism
Pergamon
Journalof Retailingand ConsumerServices,Vol.5, No. 2, pp. 129-130, 1998 Publishedby ElsevierScienceLtd. Printed in Great Britain 0969-6989/98 $19.00 + 0.00 P11:S0969-6989(97)00030-1
Book Reviews Anthropology of Tourism
Dennison Nash Pergamon, Oxford, New York and Tokyo (1996) 205 pp $66 I S B N 0 08 042398 1 Anthropology was a late-comer among the social sciences to the study of tourism - according to the author, the first anthropological publication on the topic (in English) appeared only in 1973. Nash's volume - the first in the new Tourism Social Science Series edited by Jafar Jafari - is the first book-length attempt at a comprehensive account of anthropology's achievements in the field; it is also a passionate plea for anthropology, and a potential contribution to the social sciences of tourism. The book consists of two parts, a theoretical and an applied. The first part presents what the author considers to be the three principal perspectives informing the anthropological study of tourism: acculturation and development (of hosts and the destination), personal transition (of the tourists) and tourism as a superstructure (of the tourism generating socio-economic basis). These perspectives focus on different parts of the touristic process: the causes of tourism, the experience of the tour for the tourist, and its consequences for the hosts. Curiously, however, they are presented in an inverted order (but summarized in the correct diachronical one in the concluding chapter of the first part). Each perspective is illustrated by several case studies taken from the literature. The author claims that all three perspectives and the process as a whole can be incorporated within a general paradigmatic framework of 'acculturation', commonly used by anthropologists for the study of culture contact. The second part deals with the (mostly potential) role of anthropologists in the planning and implementation of tourism projects and their possible contribution to the achievement of sustainable tourism, particularly in the less developed world. This part concludes with a discussion of the relationship between basic and applied research in the anthropological
study of tourism. A summary chapter recapitulates the principal arguments of the book. Dennison Nash was one of the first anthropologists who took up the study of strangers and tourists as an explicit topic of research; his book incorporates some of his earlier contributions to the field, and presents his comprehensive vision of it. Within the current meta-theoretical controversies in the social sciences, Nash takes up a positivist traditionalist stance, contrary to the prevailing interpretivist and other 'post-modern' approaches. For him anthropology is a holistic, universalizing science, basically akin to the natural sciences; it seeks causal explanations of human culture and conduct within a broad, comparative framework. This applies to tourism as to any other anthropological topic. In contrast to those students who consider tourism to be a distinctly modern phenomenon, Nash sees it as a human universal, and urges its comparative study throughout history and all types of human societies. Such an approach is facilitated by his very broad definition of tourism as an intersection of leisure and travel, which, at least to this reviewer, appears too vague and too comprehensive to be of much analytical use. The author seeks to infect the reader with his considerable enthusiasm for the anthropology of tourism. However, there is little in the book which is intellectually or empirically very exciting. This derives partly from the as yet modest contribution of anthropology to tourism studies, of which the author is very much aware. indeed, he makes liberal use of the contributions of kindred disciplines, especially sociology and anthropology to the topic, which enrich his empirical base. But it also derives partly from the author's reluctance to undertake a more thorough analysis of the concepts and problems which are central to his presentation. For example, though Nash makes a claim for 'acculturation' as a master concept for the anthropological study of tourism, he fails to analyze its applicability to a range of specifically touristic situations; nor does he deal with some of the more interesting 'acculturative'
phenomena in tourism, such as the emergence of new art forms, festivals, and foods in the touristic process. If he would, he might have found that what he calls 'acculturation' is a creative process, producing new cultural patterns, which are not fully comprehended by the concept. Indeed, while Nash defines 'culture' (for some reason, only at the end of the book), as the central concept in anthropology encompassing all human action, he curiously leaves out of his purview the study of more narrowly cultural phenomena accompanying the development of tourism; thus, he does not deal at all with such anthropologically most attractive topics as tourist art and souvenirs, tourist images of peoples and destinations, or photography as a tourist activity. All these hardly fit the three perspectives which according to Nash, informed most anthropological work on tourism. Nash presents a careful criticism of the work of other researchers, and points out their theoretical and methodological shortcomings. But his criticisms, while valuable, fair and positive, are not expanded into a 'critique' of the state of the field, which would open up new theoretical horizons. Indeed, he relates only tangentially to interpretivist and other 'post-modernist' work on tourism, which harbors some promising novel approaches to the field. Nash has produced a solid, fairly comprehensive work which, despite its limitations, constitutes an important stepping-stone in the consolidation of this relatively new speciality in anthropology. It will benefit any reader within or without anthropology, as an introduction to the field. Its easy and didactic style makes it easy to read for non-specialists and students. It could serve well as a text-book for an undergraduate course in the anthropology of tourism; while its extensive treatment of the applicability of anthropology to tourism planning makes it of relevance to practitioners in the field. Erik Cohen The Hebrew University o f Jerusalem
129
Journalof Retailingand ConsumerServices,Vol.5, No. 2, pp. 129-130, 1998 Publishedby ElsevierScienceLtd. Printed in Great Britain 0969-6989/98 $19.00 + 0.00 P11:S0969-6989(97)00030-1
Book Reviews Anthropology of Tourism
Dennison Nash Pergamon, Oxford, New York and Tokyo (1996) 205 pp $66 I S B N 0 08 042398 1 Anthropology was a late-comer among the social sciences to the study of tourism - according to the author, the first anthropological publication on the topic (in English) appeared only in 1973. Nash's volume - the first in the new Tourism Social Science Series edited by Jafar Jafari - is the first book-length attempt at a comprehensive account of anthropology's achievements in the field; it is also a passionate plea for anthropology, and a potential contribution to the social sciences of tourism. The book consists of two parts, a theoretical and an applied. The first part presents what the author considers to be the three principal perspectives informing the anthropological study of tourism: acculturation and development (of hosts and the destination), personal transition (of the tourists) and tourism as a superstructure (of the tourism generating socio-economic basis). These perspectives focus on different parts of the touristic process: the causes of tourism, the experience of the tour for the tourist, and its consequences for the hosts. Curiously, however, they are presented in an inverted order (but summarized in the correct diachronical one in the concluding chapter of the first part). Each perspective is illustrated by several case studies taken from the literature. The author claims that all three perspectives and the process as a whole can be incorporated within a general paradigmatic framework of 'acculturation', commonly used by anthropologists for the study of culture contact. The second part deals with the (mostly potential) role of anthropologists in the planning and implementation of tourism projects and their possible contribution to the achievement of sustainable tourism, particularly in the less developed world. This part concludes with a discussion of the relationship between basic and applied research in the anthropological
study of tourism. A summary chapter recapitulates the principal arguments of the book. Dennison Nash was one of the first anthropologists who took up the study of strangers and tourists as an explicit topic of research; his book incorporates some of his earlier contributions to the field, and presents his comprehensive vision of it. Within the current meta-theoretical controversies in the social sciences, Nash takes up a positivist traditionalist stance, contrary to the prevailing interpretivist and other 'post-modern' approaches. For him anthropology is a holistic, universalizing science, basically akin to the natural sciences; it seeks causal explanations of human culture and conduct within a broad, comparative framework. This applies to tourism as to any other anthropological topic. In contrast to those students who consider tourism to be a distinctly modern phenomenon, Nash sees it as a human universal, and urges its comparative study throughout history and all types of human societies. Such an approach is facilitated by his very broad definition of tourism as an intersection of leisure and travel, which, at least to this reviewer, appears too vague and too comprehensive to be of much analytical use. The author seeks to infect the reader with his considerable enthusiasm for the anthropology of tourism. However, there is little in the book which is intellectually or empirically very exciting. This derives partly from the as yet modest contribution of anthropology to tourism studies, of which the author is very much aware. indeed, he makes liberal use of the contributions of kindred disciplines, especially sociology and anthropology to the topic, which enrich his empirical base. But it also derives partly from the author's reluctance to undertake a more thorough analysis of the concepts and problems which are central to his presentation. For example, though Nash makes a claim for 'acculturation' as a master concept for the anthropological study of tourism, he fails to analyze its applicability to a range of specifically touristic situations; nor does he deal with some of the more interesting 'acculturative'
phenomena in tourism, such as the emergence of new art forms, festivals, and foods in the touristic process. If he would, he might have found that what he calls 'acculturation' is a creative process, producing new cultural patterns, which are not fully comprehended by the concept. Indeed, while Nash defines 'culture' (for some reason, only at the end of the book), as the central concept in anthropology encompassing all human action, he curiously leaves out of his purview the study of more narrowly cultural phenomena accompanying the development of tourism; thus, he does not deal at all with such anthropologically most attractive topics as tourist art and souvenirs, tourist images of peoples and destinations, or photography as a tourist activity. All these hardly fit the three perspectives which according to Nash, informed most anthropological work on tourism. Nash presents a careful criticism of the work of other researchers, and points out their theoretical and methodological shortcomings. But his criticisms, while valuable, fair and positive, are not expanded into a 'critique' of the state of the field, which would open up new theoretical horizons. Indeed, he relates only tangentially to interpretivist and other 'post-modernist' work on tourism, which harbors some promising novel approaches to the field. Nash has produced a solid, fairly comprehensive work which, despite its limitations, constitutes an important stepping-stone in the consolidation of this relatively new speciality in anthropology. It will benefit any reader within or without anthropology, as an introduction to the field. Its easy and didactic style makes it easy to read for non-specialists and students. It could serve well as a text-book for an undergraduate course in the anthropology of tourism; while its extensive treatment of the applicability of anthropology to tourism planning makes it of relevance to practitioners in the field. Erik Cohen The Hebrew University o f Jerusalem
129