Tourism and Tibetan Culture in Transition

This book explores the relationship between tourism, culture and ethnic identity in Shangrila, a Tibetan region in Southwest China, to show how local 'Tibetan culture' is reconstructed as a marketable commodity for tourists. It analyses the socio-economic effects of Shangrila tourism, investigating who benefits economically, while also considering its political implications and the ways in which tourism might be linked to the reassertion of ethnic identity. It goes on to examine the spatial re-imagining provoked by the development of tourism, and asks whether a tourist destination inevitably becomes a 'pseudo-community' for the visited. Can a fictitious name, invented for the sake of tourists, still provide the 'natives' of a place with a sense of identity? This book argues that conceptions of place are closely linked to notions of social identity, and in the case of Shangrila particularly to ethnic identity. Viewing the spatial as socially constructed, and place-making as vital to social organization, this is a study of how place is constructed and contested. It describes how local villagers and monastic elites have negotiated the area's religious geography, how agents of the Communist state have redefined it as a minority area, and how tourism developers are now marketing the region as Shangrila for tourist consumption. Overall, this book is an insightful account of the complex links between tourism, culture and Tibetan identity, and will be of interest to a wide range of disciplines including social anthropology, sociology, human geography, tourism and development studies.Kolas, Ashild is the author of 'Tourism and Tibetan Culture in Transition', published 2007 under ISBN 9780415434362 and ISBN 041543436X.