Cultural politics in contemporary travel writing

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Annals of Tourism Research, Vol. 33, No. 3, pp. 624–644, 2006 Ó 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Printed in Great Britain 0160-7383/$32.00

doi:10.1016/j.annals.2006.03.012

CULTURAL POLITICS IN CONTEMPORARY TRAVEL WRITING Carla Almeida Santos University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA Abstract: This study analyzes travel writing in terms of the relevant textual features contributing to intercultural communication representations in such stories. A textual analysis of the best-selling series The Best American Travel Writing 2001 was conducted. Findings suggest that ‘‘best’’ describes intercultural communication as mostly occurring when authors seek to expound upon their immediate needs and experiences. Moreover, this analysis suggests that representations rely on frequent comparisons between the host and American societies, as well as on patriarchal discourses where a normative masculinity is poised against a constructed femininity. The sociocultural significance and implications of the findings are discussed by situating travel stories within a wider discussion regarding American ideology. Keywords: travel writing, intercultural communication, ideology. Ó 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Re´sume´: Politique culturelle dans les re´cits contemporains de voyage. Cette e´tude analyse les re´cits de voyage en termes des caracte´ristiques textuelles des repre´sentations de la communication interculturelle. On a fait une analyse textuelle d’une se´rie a` succe`s des meilleurs re´cits de voyage ame´ricains en 2001. Les re´sultats indiquent que le mot ‘‘meilleur’’ de´crit surtout la communication interculturelle ou` l’auteur cherche a` exprimer ses expe´riences et ses besoins imme´diats. En plus, l’analyse sugge`re que les repre´sentations de´pendent des comparaisons fre´quentes entre la socie´te´ d’accueil et les E´tats-Unis aussi bien que des discours patriarcaux ou` une masculinite´ normative est pose´e contre une fe´minite´ construite. On discute de la signification socioculturelle et des implications des re´sultats en situant ces re´cits dans une discussion plus large concernant l’ide´ologie ame´ricaine. Mots-cle´s: re´cits de voyage, communication interculturelle, ide´ologie. Ó 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

INTRODUCTION For centuries, publishing one’s travel experiences has been a popular means of sharing impressions and memories. In the early 20th century, with the power of a global society and the increasing interest in travelers’ experiences, a wealth of printed narrative genres, such as travelogues, became widely available (Clough 1997; Dann 1999; Seaton 1999). These offer what has not been experienced before by representing it through transforming the moment with extravagant vocabulary and details in order to seduce readers. Therefore, given tourism’s long narrative history, it is understandable that such stories continue to be Carla Almeida Santos is Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois Department of Recreation, Sport and Tourism, Champaign IL 61820, USA. Email ). She holds a PhD in mass communication with an emphasis in tourism. Her principal research interests include sociocultural aspects of tourism in the context of mass mediated messages and the politics of representation. 624

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the topic of much investigation. In particular, studies have increasingly examined and theorized the ways in which experiences are textually represented (Bhattacharyya 1997; Bruner 1991; Dann 1999; Duncan and Gregory 1999; Fu¨rsich 2002; Hall and Kinnaird 1994; Lutz and Collins 1993; McGregor 2000; Pratt 1992; Santos 2004). A number of these investigations approach tourism discourse as an imperialist force in order to reveal the ‘‘imperial stylistics’’ and ideological views established in Western travel narratives (Pratt 1992; Said 1976). As Bruner so eloquently stated, these are ‘‘as much a structure of power as they are a structure of meaning’’, serving to provide social role models that position the tourist and the host in relationship to each other (1991:240). Thus, due to its representational role, travel writing can be approached as a reflection of dominant ideologies, which ‘‘provide us with the means of ‘making sense’ of social relations and our place in them’’ (Hall 1995:19). One approach to exposing the ideological position within American writing is through examining its representations of intercultural communication—defined in this study as representations of experiences and, or interactions with the host, as well as explanations resulting from observing the host. Thus, how writers and editors choose to represent such experiences and/or interactions situates their writing within a wider discussion regarding ideology, because such texts ‘‘expose the author’s culturally specific ‘ways of seeing’ the world, as all of them, to different degrees, are now considered to incorporate the culture of the author’’ (McGregor 2000:28). With this in mind, the current study analyzes travel writing in terms of the relevant textual features contributing to representations of intercultural communication and indicating US ideologies that frame choices made when authoring and editing stories. It asks what some of the major intercultural communication themes highlighted in American travel writing are, and how these themes support a particular ideological position. To answer these questions, a textual analysis of the best-selling series The Best American Travel Writing 2001 was conducted. In the same way as other approaches identifying meanings of tourism (Wearing 1998), this study offers a deconstructive reading of these stories in order to explore the intercultural communication themes emphasized and, as the title of ‘‘best’’ suggests, rewarded. From a cultural studies perspective, these themes generate and promote images and paradigms that characterize Americans’ relationship to and expectations of the Other. By recycling images such as ‘‘the peripheral Other’’, a ‘‘deprived’’, and ‘‘treacherous’’ world finds a comfortable place in the American mind, ‘‘fixing the Other in a timeless present’’ (Pratt 1985:120). Nonetheless, as Spivak argued, by participating in discussions regarding representations of the Other, scholars engage ‘‘in the ideological production of neocolonialism’’ (1988:210). In this sense, while attempting to engage with representations of intercultural communication, this study must necessarily acknowledge its position within an American academic institution and position its approach ‘‘not as descriptions of the way things are, but as something that one must adopt to produce a critique of anything’’ (Spivak 1990:51). Therefore, while it seeks to build on the

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understanding of cultural politics in contemporary travel writing, it does not wish to speak for the Other; it seeks ‘‘not to represent (verstreten) them but to learn how to represent (darstellen) ourselves’’ (Spivak 1988a:288–289). INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION AND TRAVEL WRITING Intercultural communication research has been highly influenced by a variety of traditional disciplines such as sociology, anthropology, psychology, and philosophy (Gudykunst and Kim 1992). As a result, theories of intercultural communication, as well as concepts central to it, have suffered from a certain amount of ambiguity. However, central to any discussion of intercultural communication are the concepts of communication—the symbolic process through which people create shared meaning (Lustig and Koester 1996)—and culture—the pattern of beliefs, behaviors, and values that are learned, shared, and maintained by various groups of people (Bennett 1998). Gudykunst and Kim classify intercultural communication as ‘‘a transactional, symbolic process involving the attribution of meaning between people from different cultures’’ (1992:13–14). As such, it refers to the verbal and nonverbal interactions of individuals with differing patterns of behavior and/or from differing cultural backgrounds (Brislin 1993; Samovar and Porter 1994). Considering that tourism brings together such differing parties, it is understandable that tourism scholars have sought to examine and theorize intercultural communication and cultural differences (Amir and Ben-Ari 1985; Brown 1998; D’Amore 1988; Pizam 1998; Reisinger and Turner 1994; Robinson 1998; Santos and Proffitt 2004). Particularly relevant to this study is the critical intercultural communication approach, which focuses on examining and understanding human behavior in order to change the power relations present in communication. This approach locates culture as a site of contention where conflicting interpretations and meanings work themselves out under the ruling of a dominant culture and its ideology (Martin and Nakayama 1996). Its main goal is to empower individuals to resist oppressive power structures by providing an understanding of the power relations present and depicted in intercultural communication. Such an approach is particularly useful here because it does not flatten out intercultural communications as generic colonial or imperialist. But rather, as a sociocultural struggle, it recognizes that travel writing it is a hybrid mass mediated genre which seeks to provide aesthetically pleasing narratives that satisfy readers’ desire for otherness (Prasad and Prasad 1994). This desire for otherness allows for narratives that contrast an ‘‘advanced’’ Westerner against an inferior Other (Mills 1991). Such narratives stress struggle, overcoming the world, and conquering the unknown—all examples of our desire to master the world and the Other. Indeed, while some experiences may last but a moment, the process of narrating them recovers that moment and allows writer, editors, and readers to psychologically take pleasure in the expe-

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rience. ‘‘For writing is, in a sense, a means of traveling backwards; the experience of the journey remembered and reconfigured consciously as well as unconsciously, via our cultural imagination’’ (Fullagar 2000a:60). Furthermore, while this writing may have changed from a predominantly Western undertaking to a global phenomenon, many of those contributing to travel writing do so by following Western stylistics (Fullagar 2002; Pratt 1992; Riessman 1994). In this manner, such narratives are repeatedly written to a Western audience by offering generalized accounts that promote singular notions of desire and escape, and with experiences spotlighting a discourse that views Western culture as the center and destinations visited as the peripheries (Blunt and Rose 1994; Pritchard 1998). Therefore, a critical intercultural approach allows for a discussion on how representations of intercultural communication in American travel stories validate the writer, editor, and readers’ reality; situating those stories within a wider discussion regarding US ideology. Indeed, while travel writing is a ‘‘vehicle of tourist socialization. . .which, perhaps more than any other, adopts a critical stance to the overall phenomenon it is treating’’ (Dann 1999:160), by reading cultural signs authors and editors reproduce power relations that contribute to the separation between writer/reader and the Other (Urry 1990). Representational and Ideological Issues Given that representations are critical for identity politics—as identities are constructed within representations (Grossberg 1996; Hall 1996)—it is important to recognize that the ways in which intercultural communication is represented do play a constitutive role, rather than a reflexive one. ‘‘No textual staging is ever innocent. We are always inscribing values in our writing’’ (Richardson 1990:12). Consequently, the sociocultural struggle embodied in travel writing affirms that there is a relationship between lived experiences and larger sociocultural forces (Grossberg 1993, 1997; Turner 1992). As Carey proposed, ‘‘media present stories that draw people together in their shared beliefs’’ Carey (1988:18). Stories rewarded in The Best American Travel Writing provide narrative representations of intercultural communication, as well as ‘‘tell’’ the stories of America. That is, auhors and editors approach stories with their own cultural values and long-held shared narratives in mind. By drawing on conventional approaches that support and sustain the American social order, they help readers make sense of the world and their place in it. This function of consistency and reassurance must to be kept in mind so as to avoid introducing what Spivak (1988a, 1988b), Spivak (1990) calls a form of ‘‘epistemic violence’’ (to speak for the Other), and also to avoid dismissing the ways in which writers and editors produce and reinforce US hegemony. To be sure, it is the power of representations to contribute to the ways in which one makes sense of the world and the place in it that makes mass-mediated narratives, such as travel writing, particularly

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influential (Allan 1999; Grossberg, Wartella and Whitney 1998; Zelizer 1997). Such mass-mediated narratives are filled with enduring Western cultural and social ideological values which, some propose, transform and/or destroy the Other’s national culture. However, notions of ‘‘local cultures being battered out of existence’’ by Western (mainly American) media products may no longer be valid (Tunstall 1977:57). Indeed, much of the current criticism regarding media/cultural imperialism focuses on its approach to national culture as essential and desirable. Such an approach, critics argue, fails to recognize ‘‘national culture’’ not only as unrepresentative of the diverse and varied elements found in an individual society but as dismissing grass-roots groups in the name of national unity (Sreberny 2000; Thompson 1995; Tomlinson 1991; Waisbord 1998). Similarly, traditional approaches to colonialism have also been revisited, seeking to challenge extant theories that portray colonialism as uncontested and efficacious in its efforts, revealing it instead as a complex cultural process with its own array of discourses, internal tensions, and contradictions. Arguing that to focus on what colonialism was is to deny what colonialism is, Thomas (1994) proposes colonialism as a process in which subjugated populations are represented in ways that legitimize the understanding of racial and cultural differences. Accordingly, ‘‘the question must always arise of what claims are being made by particular texts, how and why they employ notions of national, racial, or cultural difference and what political concerns are embodied in, or furthered by, particular descriptions’’ (Thomas 1994:25–26).

Study Methods The text analyzed in this study included all 26 travel stories (405 pages of text) published in Houghton Mifflin’s Best American series,The Best American Travel Writing 2001. This best-selling series was selected as providing an appropriate sample because it brings together what is judged and rewarded as superlative travel writing from thousands of submissions published yearly in the United States. In addition, this particular year’s series captured a phase of transition in the construction of American identity following September 11: both a push for the strengthening of American national identity and an increasing call for intercultural communication as a tool for a better understanding of different cultures and world views. This series was the result of a yearly solicitation for submissions from editors and writers of travel stories published during the calendar year in a variety of monthly and weekly American magazines, newspapers, literary journals, and in-flight magazines; all the stories were new pieces, not excerpts from previously published books. Hundreds of submissions from publications such as The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, National Geographic Traveler, Conde´ Nast Traveler, and Travel & Leisure were submitted. Partly guided by Paul Theroux’s definition of best travel writing as ‘‘a journey of discovery that is frequently risky and sometimes grim and often pure horror, with a happy ending: to hell and back’’

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(2001:xix), each story was reviewed by the series editor and an invited guest editor who collectively selected the top 26 stories for inclusion. The selections include many familiar names such as Tim Cahill, Ian Frazier, and Pico Iyer, including names not associated with travel writing, such as Salman Rushdie. Consequently, due to the broad range of submissions, publications, and authors, as well as the selection process conducted by the series’ highly-regarded editor, these stories serve to identify US editorial approaches to the relevance and importance of certain topics, destinations, and writing styles, exposing the modes of intercultural communication considered to be fitting of a superlative travel narrative. All 26 stories were submitted to a textual analysis, which focuses on the cultural and ideological assumptions of a text by exploring the ‘‘latent meaning of the text’’ and ‘‘why the content is like that’’ (Hall 1995:16). Therefore, through the examination of signs, symbols, and other signifiers, textual analysis exposes signification processes by identifying subjective or cultural forms realized and made available in a text (Acosta-Alzuru and Roushanzamir 2000; Fair and Astroff 1991; Parisi 1998). Here, textual analysis allowed situating the considerable significance of intercultural communication within a wider discussion regarding travel writing practices and ideologies. To engage these stories, this study relied on elements of Foss’ (1996) model of ideological criticism. This model is particularly appropriate because it proposes that texts support a specific ideological position. Following Foss’ model, first an artifact to analyze was selected: The Best American Travel Writing 2001. Next, the unit of analysis was selected: in this study, that unit is the analyzed text and criticism (more below). Finally, the ideological interests at stake within the artifact were located. Therefore, the analysis of the text and its elements served to locate both the ideological underpinnings of the text, as well as the rhetorical strategies that allow the ideological process to sustain itself within and across. All 26 stories were read and analyzed by four independent coders (two American and two international) to avoid cross-contamination and to assist in in-depth discussion of the findings. The first stage of the analysis involved a ‘‘long preliminary soak’’ (Hall 1995:15) in the text— every case was read with particular attention to the stories’ order in the compilation, as well as some of the overall narrative points evoked. The second stage involved close reading and identification of discursive strategies with particular attention to the intercultural communication elements emphasized: the discursive strategies utilized to describe any interaction with the host, as well as explanations and observations resulting from observing the host. This second stage reading was done on a story-by-story basis, with narrative structure and use of metaphors noted in analysis sheets, which were then used as pointers while recurrent patterns were noted. For example, terms and phrases such as ‘‘they looked after my needs, they escorted us’’, and ‘‘they’d drive me’’ were used to identify stories relating specifically to the theme ‘‘They looked after my needs’’. Terms and phrases such as ‘‘the Chinaman’s statue resembles the smaller plastic one of Colonel Sanders, we just love America’’, and ‘‘it is cooler to say you got it in the United State’’, were used to

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identify stories relating specifically to the theme ‘‘All things American.’’ Further, terms and phrases such as ‘‘just like us but a woman, forget-menot-blue eyes’’, and ‘‘passionate nature’’ were used to identify stories relating specifically to the theme ‘‘Normative masculinity versus constructed femininity.’’ Finally, these themes were interpreted within the framework of the study revealing the ideological underpinnings of what is rewarded as the ‘‘best’’ travel writing. Study Results In the Foreword of The Best American Travel Writing 2001, Jason Wilson, the series editor, urges readers to recognize the necessity for intercultural experiences: The person who uses this item (KwikpointTM International Translator) is a person who, at worst, has an absolute, almost colonial, need to exert control over any people, place, or situation he encounters. The message: I can’t understand a word you’re saying, but it doesn’t matter, because I can point to a picture of pancakes and syrup, and you will fetch it for me. (Wilson 2001:xiii)

With this Foreword, as well as throughout the volume, the editors position the compilation and its reading as an ethical endeavor which presents a social and cultural critique of colonial, patronizing, and condescending worldviews, resonating the old moral ethics of romanticist discourses often found in travel writing. They deliberately tell readers that they will be better individuals upon reading this volume. As such, the volume begins by addressing a culturally identified American audience—the ‘‘sophisticated’’ American—by referencing ‘‘provincial’’ Americans, who lack an understanding of the world and empathy. This implies that by reading The Best American Travel Writing readers are somehow exempt from these judgments. This audience looks down at those individuals who embody traditional straightforward, ‘‘unsophisticated’’ American colonial ideologies; such condescension—which, among other things in this volume, serves to exert textual control—situates the volume in the politics of culture and identities in contemporary United States. The identification of such textual control in several of the ‘‘best’’ stories proposes that the concern should not focus on the existence or lack of intercultural representations but rather on how they exercise power and control. Three main underlying themes were identified: ‘‘They looked after my needs and then went back’’—in this theme, the host travels from the periphery to the center, tends to the writers’ immediate needs and returns to the periphery; ‘‘All things American’’—in this theme, American people and culture serve as a comparative model for discussions and observations regarding the host; and, Normative masculinity versus constructed femininity—in this theme, women are described according to their physical distinctiveness while males need

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no description; they are men. Following is a discussion of each of these themes, along with excerpts from the stories analyzed. Theme One: They Looked After my Needs. Particularly in South America, Africa, and Asia, findings suggest a pattern of interaction with the hosts who are there to meet the writers’ immediate needs. In this sense, the host is in the story only in so far as it enables them to achieve their goals. The following is an excerpt from one’s adventure down the Mosquito Coast: In the strange way that news travels in the jungle, the Indians seemed to know of us ahead of time. One man, noticing we had only sticks and the bamboo rudder with which to steer, threw us his hand-carved oar as we passed. Others paddled out of their dugouts to give us tortillas or motioned us ashore to share a meal of beans and grilled monkey. (Anderson 2001:14–15)

The author then continues to describe his adventure down the coast. Interestingly, while the hosts help out in times of need, there is no direct recounting of conversations or interaction with those who help. Surely, one would think that when sharing a meal the writer would engage in some form of interaction with those providing the meal, or, at the very least, would have more to say about the encounter than what the host did for him. In this fashion, the hosts are ‘‘allowed’’ to leave the periphery assigned to them and come into the center only to be of assitance; once the needs are met, the host ‘‘returns’’ to the periphery. However, while there is no direct recounting of conversations or interaction, there are judgments regarding communicative processes throughout the volume. For instance, in reference to the previous quote, the term ‘‘strange’’ which serves to designate Other/different/foreign is an exemplary illustration of a construction of a stereotypical Other. It is ‘‘strange’’ because it is mysterious to the writer and occurs in the depths of the ‘‘jungle’’; such a description relates to a judgment regarding communicative practices. Another example comes from one who describes himself as a wellknown journalist to a variety of hosts he meets along the way. The following two excerpts describe how he evaded ongoing demonstrations and barricades: ‘‘Luis and Monica said that if we were interested, they could show us a way around the barricade. And so the very people who had been blocking our way ten minutes earlier got into the car and directed us back the way we had come’’, and ‘‘In the end, we piled a pair of soldiers into the back seat and they escorted us to the house, just as the students had directed us around their barricade’’ (Cahill 2001:31– 32). The host is seen as an assistant rather than part of the experience and so, once again, the host travels from the periphery to the center, to assists and then to return to the periphery. Other examples of the host assisting, ‘‘Certainly, they looked after my needs in much the same way a desert Bedouin might look after a famished guest’’ (Millman 2001:195), and

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Mr. Thinlips deftly chopped vegetables on a log, then kneaded dough. He built a fire in a wood-burning stove and began preparing Tibetan noodle soup while Li spread a quilt over a board in a corner of the hut, then threw a Tibetan coat, lined with a mangy sheepskin, on top of it: My bed and bedding. . . it was just as it looked – hard and cold. (Lee 2001:161)

Such accounts favor notions of servitude and are part of a larger need to preserve traditional host/guest relationships deeply rooted in colonialist ideals of servitude; they further suggest that narratives are rooted in the sociocultural understanding of the writer and the reader (Santos 2004). For example, discussing his experience in Russia, this travel writer remains skeptical of most Russians he encounters: I think of the large tip I will give her at the end of the day, anticipating her surprise and pleasure. Then a suspicion enters my mind: Has she been putting on an act and playing on my sympathy precisely so that I will give her money? (Malcolm 2001:173)

Such representations remind one to constantly be vigilant of the host; what is missing is a discussion that questions why Russians would have the need to put on an act and play on the sympathy of American tourists. By relying on such narratives, the writer opens space for a normalization process which transfers powerful political differences between the United States and Russia, to Russians’ greed and their nation’s inability to provide basic necessities. It conceals the continuing unevenness of power relations between the United States and the rest of the world, making writers, editors, and readers accomplices by their infrequent questioning and engaging of such discussions. Furthermore, confining the host to the periphery allows for a lack of acknowledgement of the host’s sociocultural, political, and economic intricacies, and reveals travel writing as a powerful tool for detachment between a nation’s past and its present. Such representations fail to acknowledge experiences of colonialism that continue into the present (Said 1986; Thomas 1994). For example, recounting an experience in China, a writer describes her level of satisfaction: ‘‘Sichuan satisfied every expectation I unconsciously held about the country: peasants in emerald rice fields, mountains laced with mist. . . In Sichuan, you can experience the China of the late twentieth century and the old China of willow-patterned plates. . .’’ (Lee 2001:153). A sense of charming poverty prevails while the connection between China’s past and present is never made, allowing the reader to trust that China’s past and present are isolated and unrelated. To be exact, by stressing intercultural communication experiences that reveal the ability of the host and destinations to accommodate the needs and fantasies of the reader, writers and editors circumvent discussions of colonialism and its impacts in these destinations; they thus further the notion that current conditions are a sign of the culture’s reluctance to develop rather than a result of its past, as well as Western mass tourism. As such, the significance and subjectivity of US economic and political power remains somehow outside of the act of traveling, providing readers with representations of contented

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natives always willing to help—and when they are not, they are disparaged for it: ‘‘To get basic tourist information (not daring to hope for some deeper insight), I had found most personal encounters unpleasant. It ranged from the sullen indifference. . .to the brusque, unsmiling replies. . .to the hostile glare. . .’’ (Swick 2001:304). This is problematic, as Said argued, because ‘‘ideas, cultures, and histories cannot seriously be understood or studied without. . .their configurations of power, also being studied’’ (1991:7) Finally, confining the host to the periphery allows one to be a survivor, an expert, or a savior. Consequently, the hosts are included not only when tending to the needs of the writer, but also as witnesses to one’s extraordinary experiences. For example, in his adventure down the Mosquito Coast, a writer declares, ‘‘word had spread. . .of the folly being planned down the riverbank. . .a good two hundred Miskitos had gathered in the bluff to see us off. . .they waved goodbye to us as if we were sailing off into the abyss. . .’’ (Anderson 2001:14). Elsewhere, ‘‘I felt sorry for her, so I treated her to a bowl of noodle soup’’ (Orlean 2001:236), and ‘‘travel is the best way we have of rescuing the humanity of places, and saving them from abstraction and ideology. And in the process, we also get saved from abstraction ourselves, and come to see how much we can bring to places we visit’’ (Iyer 2001:144). In this last excerpt, the writer affirms his own ‘‘reality’’ and experiences by justifying his role as a rescuer of humanity who protects hosts from dominant ideologies; however, no consideration is given to the fact that by composing the story the writer represents the destination and its people, imposing upon them his own ideological values. Therefore, in order to present readers with stories of survival, escape, and encounters with an exotic Other, writers rely heavily on peripheral, mystical destinations and people. When examined, these stories exploit essential human values and use universal modes of expression in order to appeal to basic human emotions. Overcoming the world and nature, and pushing the body to its limits, are examples of our desire to master the world. This desire is characterized and deep-seated in notions of hardship, discipline, and actualization that are fundamental in American ideology. The ‘‘best’’ writing, therefore, reveals its ideological stance by describing how by mastering far off destinations and people, authors are able to achieve individual autonomy and worldly knowledge. At best, intercultural communication in travel writing ends with the recognition that there are other disconnected histories, avoiding discussions regarding other ‘‘ways of knowing’’ that might question US ideology (Radhakrishnan 1994). This is particularly problematic because the ‘‘best’’ American writing specifies a path of ‘‘development’’ and ‘‘progress’’ which often relies on an uneven transfer of economic and social resources. By assigning the host a peripheral role and by focusing on issues of progress and development—hallmarks of US ideology—these stories serve to perpetuate modes of control that support and sustain the American social order by helping readers make sense of the world and their place in it.

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Theme Two: All Things American. Particularly in Asia and the Middle East, representations of intercultural communication serve to center accounts on US social and cultural domination. That is, American people, culture, and ways of living serve as a comparative and standard model for discussions and observations regarding the host. These representations are centered in a discourse that views the US as progressive, developed, and emulated. For example, ‘‘He had clearly selected a favorite shirt for the voyage: a New York Knicks basketball jersey’’ (Finkel 2001:118), ‘‘Cowboys and China do not mix easily. . .I had no notion what to expect the next morning when I met with Songpan cowboys: Li, the head wrangler, had dreamy eyes and an Elvis lock of hair in his forehead’’ (Lee 2001:159), ‘‘Titanic cream bars, with pictures of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet on the wrappers’’ (Hessler 2001:136), and ‘‘You can’t believe how they loved it. . .so many people longing to bow down and say, sir, sir, we just love America’’ (Rushdie 2001:262). Or, in a story where the focus is meant to be on the struggles of locals seeking to protect their traditions and culture from tourism development and the penetration of American culture, the writer articulates his experience in a way that confirms to the reader that those who seek to resist American penetration will ultimately fall prey to it. He describes a local’s attitude toward America and all things American: I want to live in the United States. I went to summer school at Harvard but I didn’t like it because the people were snobby. But I loved Disney World. . .I am going to get a tattoo. . .it is cooler to say you got it in the United States. (Wilson 2001:399)

In this manner, the US is interpreted and perceived as a leading and emulated culture. Such narratives ignore historical and social context, allowing writers and editors to avoid exploring complex situations by relying on personalized story frames. Furthermore, these ‘‘best’’ stories are, perhaps, awarded such a title because they reaffirm Americans’ most-cherished beliefs about themselves and the country. In beliefs regarding emulation, American standards not only serve to satisfy the needs of the weak and underprivileged, but also serve to tame and civilize those represented. But more significantly, we carry values and beliefs and news to the places we go, and in many parts of the world, we become walking video screens and living newspapers, the only channels that can take people out of the censored limits of their homelands. (Iyer 2001:144)

These stories valorize compassion and willingness to help others less fortunate by describing how around the world there is a desire for all things American. Such representations serve as an important model for American public opinion about the world, because they help to establish the range of criteria for defining, debating, and resolving social issues. As Gronbeck (2001) describes, suppression by omission serves to explain much of mass media content. Stories that might reflect poorly upon, or contradict, US dominant ideological values are not likely to see the light, situating subjects and the their culture in an in-between stage (Duncan and Gregory 1999). The ways in which

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these ‘‘best’’ travel stories visualize destinations and cultures bear witness to one overarching theme in US relationships to other nations: the world’s dependency and emulation of America. It is this dependency and emulation relationship, reflected particularly in narratives that stress the hosts’ desire for American commodities and lifestyles, which is reflected in these stories. Such narratives continue a long tradition of promoting US enduring ideological values, including ethnocentrism (this is the best country in the world), democracy (its politics reflect the public interests of all citizens), and capitalism (all its citizens benefit from capitalism). (Gans 1980:39–57) Theme Three: Normative Masculinity Versus Constructed Femininity. Particularly in Asia, South America, and Africa, findings suggest that to be a tourist implies both a certain position of advantage and manliness. Narratives that depict assertiveness, rationality, and heroic acts were found to be the foundation of many of these stories; such attempts were centered on notions of manliness. In the process, incorporating women into these texts often means comparing them to a male norm (Clifford 1997; Mills 1990; Wolff 1995). That is to say, when female tourists, as well as female hosts, are part of these narratives, writers frequently included by comparing them to a normalized masculinity and describing them according to their physical characteristics. ‘‘The other players— two men who played fiercely and rapidly and a woman wearing the latest Chinese fashion, a tight chiffon dress slit to her hips and a pair of heels with ankle-length nylon socks’’ (Lee 2001:152). Or, ‘‘a stranger next to me, a climber with a backpack and park, crampons and an ice ax, just like us, but a woman. . .she was a lovely dark-haired woman, in her mid-thirties perhaps, with an easy smile’’ (Banks 2001:27); ‘‘At last minute, Jen’s wife, Ilaitsuk, a strong, handsome woman a few years older than her husband decides to come with us’’ (Ehrlich 1997:90); and ‘‘Tibetan women wearing their braids wrapped around their heads with scarves and coral beads’’. (Lee 2001:159) In contrast, when describing males, a certain notion of normality is inserted into the narratives by using descriptions such as: ‘‘In it were Scott and Marv, businessmen from suburban Chicago, who were tooling around the desert in Marv’s high-tech, diesel-powered, tanklike, very expensive Hummer. . .’’ (Frazier 2001:129), or ‘‘On my arrival, an unsmiling young man named Igor, who spoke Fluent English. . .’’ (Malcolm 2001:167). This dissimilarity in representations is particularly evident in the following two excerpts, both describing young African hosts: ‘‘Linda Akello was in the bush for a year and a half and is now six months pregnant with a rebel’s child. She’s a tall beautiful sixteen-year old with a narrow chin and high cheekbones, wearing a pink chiffonlike dress with wide white lapels slipping off her long shoulders. Crocheting a yellow doily she speaks in sweet, dull tones’’ (Minot 2001:224); conversely, ‘‘He’s just a kid. His name is Sabastian. He is illiterate, was raised right here in Caqueta province, and has never traveled anywhere except on patrol. He has been a fighter for ‘a few years’’’. (Symmes 1999:323)

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Such intercultural narratives call into question the foundational category of gender; it assumes a normative masculinity poised against a femininity construed as a lack or deviation (Butler 1990). Such objectification, Said (1991) argued, is the foundation of patriarchal discourses both in Europe and in the colonies. In this case, ‘‘best’’ writing carries on discourses which reinforce an American masculinity. Indeed, post-structuralist feminists have paid particular attention to patriarchal dominance in tourism discourse by examining power and gender as it relates to the Other. Their work has created an awareness of the politics of class, race, and gender in tourism by calling attention to the centrality of the Western male in determining tourism practices (Fullagar 2000a, 2000b; 2002; Wearing and Wearing 1996). As Wearing states, ‘‘Male power in patriarchal society has enabled males to define human essence, language, and discourses in the image and interests of males’’ (1996:72). The process of constructing females as lacking or deviating from males—where they are described as physical rather than complete beings—reconfirms previous work by Enloe (1989), Urry (1990), Hall and Kinnaird (1994), and most recently Fullagar (2002). They find that women in the tourism industry are often relegated to physically passive and posing roles, predominantly featured as youthful exotic and quiet beings that become part of the surrounding landscape. Moreover, this confirms Clifford’s criticism that ‘‘Good travel (heroic, educational, scientific, adventurous, ennobling) is something men (should) do. Women are impeded from serious travel’’ (1997:25). It is this normative masculinity poised against a constructed femininity that reveals representations of intercultural communication as patriarchal. As such, writers, editors, and readers are complicit with the very forces of domination that continue to reproduce a past that reinforces, accepts, and in the case of The Best American Travel Writing 2001, rewards predominantly privileged male perspectives. These stories, rewarded with the title of ‘‘best’’, signal through their use of discourse that they are written for a male audience consumed with conquering, taming, and civilizing; thus they fail to address the realities and various forms of gender power for which American modes of interpretation and representation may be inadequate. Viewing Positions. This study has identified three underlying themes with regard to intercultural communication representations in The Best American Travel Writing 2001. When closely examined, these themes propose two different viewing positions. First, the writer who tries to grasp the country by commandingly summarizing the visited culture (Urry 1990). ‘‘In its scramble to reemerge as a regional financial and cultural center, Lebanon has become a frantic place, beset with overcrowding and a floundering economy, in addition to the region’s political instability’’ (Said 2001:285). And,

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At first I thought everyone was angry, an exoticized anger in a language that sounded like music sans melody. Then I realized that the Chinese were like my Italian relatives: loud. I began to like the country and its people; the chaos and noise of human exchange was oddly familiar, while nearly everything else. . .was delightfully strange. (Lee 2001:153)

Second, the writer as an observer who seeks to see the world and, in the process, learns from it. As one explained when describing the aims and purposes of the journey: I know that I travel in large part in search of hardship—both my own, which I want to feel, and others’, which I need to see. Travel in that sense guides us toward a better balance of wisdom and compassion— of seeing the world clearly, and yet feeling it truly. (Iyer 2001:142)

Another stated, ‘‘travel can be an extraordinary redemptive experience’’ (Winchester 2001:402). Both of these viewing positions propose that readers pay no heed to sociocultural power struggles endogenous to the destination by providing them with reassured summaries of the visited culture and by incorporating narratives into a connected experience, ultimately making sense of the world and American public opinion. By promoting US enduring ideological values, including compassion, capitalism, and democracy, these ‘‘best’’ stories document and represent a journey which passes along to this particular American reader the power to observe and learn from Others by drawing on conventional approaches that support and sustain US social order. Mass mediated representations, such as those in travel writing, are often replicated (and thus legitimated) among popular cultural products (Bhattacharyya 1997). The cultural meanings born from such representations possess a breadth of symbolism wider than the actual consumption of tourism products and places themselves (Morgan and Pritchard 1998). In a way, contemporary writing, through its representations, has the potential to serve as an instrument of homogenization and stereotyping, leading to generalizations that bring to question tourism’s possibilities for intercultural communication. This is particularly disconcerting because, as McGregor (2000) found, lack of intercultural communication can lead to further generalizations. MacCannell, arguing the culture of tourism as a ‘‘millennial stage of colonialism’’, stated that ‘‘the actual difference is that the earlier displaced symbols have the dignity of marketing actual historical events. . .their contemporary relatives mark nothing but the power of global capital to efface history and to construct generic localities, or to package identity’’. (2001:385) Findings from this study indicate that the stories analyzed reproduce power relationships by assigning the host to the periphery, by focusing on all things American, by perpetuating gender biases, and by their portrayal of travel as an experience which allows one to challenge the Others’ world and win. By adopting these dynamics of representation, writers and editors support particular sociocultural, political, and economic strategies. Overall, these stories and their fo-

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cus reveal and perpetuate the myth that locals are happy with their submissive status, making it easier to accept global conditions. ‘‘I find myself helplessly enchanted with the place. . .it turns out to be unutterably beautiful, its people are as friendly as any one can find. . .he is one of the happiest and most remarkable men I have ever met’’ (Winchester 2001:404). Considering Smith’s (1990) position that discourse is the foundation upon which social relations are controlled and negotiated, it is reasonable to propose that stories awarded the title of ‘‘best’’ travel writing model the type of intercultural communication which reinforces readers’ beliefs and value system. Moreover, the intercultural communication themes identified above allow for American economic and political power to remain outside the act of traveling. By failing, at times, to provide readers with sociocultural and historical contexts within which to understand the situations introduced, dominant Western notions are reproduced over and over again. This allows writers and editors to ensure their innocence while asserting their power. This is what power is about: the powerful are able to decide what stories will be told, by whom, in what discursive space. . .when the tourist-native encounter is referred to, one must not think of a person-to-person, one-to-one relationship. . .for this masks the world system and discursive dimensions that frame the relationship, a frame set by Western discourse and by the hegemonic tourist narrative. (Bruner 1991:241–242)

CONCLUSION Particularly relevant to this study was the critical intercultural communication approach, which allowed for the examination and understanding of both writing and editorial choices. Such choices, it is believed, provide insight into the power relations present in communication because they serve to locate dominant cultural and ideological meanings. Through the identification and examination of such choices an understanding of the power relations present and depicted in the ‘‘best’’ travel writing are revealed, empowering individuals to resist dominant structures. In the context of this study, such power relations reveal that regardless of the departure of colonial powers, American travel writing with its thematic dynamics and global pervasiveness preserves notions of subjectivity which ensure and sustain US political power structures. In the process, by relying on hierarchical oppositions of center versus periphery, advanced versus backward, normalized male versus constructed female, the ‘‘best’’ travel writing establishes relationships of power that provide justification for US exploration, exploitation, and colonization. Combined, these choices express a larger ideological stance: such is the world, such is the privilege of being an American, and such is the power of Americans to help the world. One must ask, however, is an ideological stance exclusive to American travel writing? The answer is no. All travel writing is a product of the writers’ extraordinary experi-

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ences and their own culturally specific interpretation of those experiences (ways of seeing). It is the writers’ use of culturally specific ways of interpreting and narrating an experience that provides narratives with a cultural shape of their own. This cultural shape may vary but is necessary because it provides for those readers who share the authors’ cultural specific ways of seeing a ‘‘manageable’’ and ‘‘gratifying’’ reading experience. Furthermore, this does not merely happen in the United States. Instead, there is a globalization of hegemonic intercultural communication narratives taking place, the product of the emergence of a world system of communications where a select few are able to describe the world from their own perspective. These select few: . . .dislike the local, the national, the indigenous and are often quite enthralled by a new kind of cosmopolitan internationalism very much based on the metaphors of consumption and appropriation, and often combined with a desire for connoisseurship concerning the vast array of world objects that are accessible to them. (Friedman 2000: 142)

As with all investigation, this study provides issues for future direction. Further exploration of this topic may include research on the travel writing production process, as well as a larger sample of travel stories from a variety of Western and other nations. Meanings created through texts and their discursive strategies depend upon the meanings of other texts. That is, they carry within them characteristics of previous texts; by studying the discursive strategies of a variety of travel discourses it is possible to expose and locate how they relate to their ideological contexts. Finally, while other discursive strategies and perspectives ought to be approached in future research, the premise offered in this paper is that to be considered by writer and editors as the ‘‘best’’ American travel writing, they must draw on conventional approaches that support and sustain US social order. Therefore, editorial choices for the ‘‘best’’ American travel writing suggest that the most relevant and paramount stories for these particular American readers are those which provide them with reassurance regarding their own ways of living by helping them make sense of the world and their place in it. Acknowledgements—The author would like to thank Kellee Caton for her insightful comments and suggestions on this paper.

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Submitted 7 August 2004. Resubmitted 25 February 2005. Resubmitted 29 October 2005. Accepted 13 December 2005. Refereed anonymously. Coordinating Editor: Christopher Endy