20.05.10 | 18:30

Contesting, Planning and Promoting World Heritage in the Canary Islands

Dr. Raoul Bianchi (University of East London)

AG „Tourism and the Oriental and Exotic Other“
Institut für Ethnologie
Reichardtstraße 11
06114 Halle/Saale
Seminarraum

Raoul Bianchi is a Principal Lecturer in Tourism and Leisure at the University of East London, UK. He specialises in the sociology of tourism development and the international political economy of tourism. He has also published on the politics of tourism and cultural heritage, including World heritage, with particular emphasis on Spain and the Canary Islands.

This presentation will explore the inter-relationship between tourism and World Heritage through the lens of research carried out into local responses and perceptions of World Heritage in Garajonay National Park in La Gomera, the Canary Islands. It will also provide an opportunity to reflect upon the relationship between World Heritage and tourism in general, in relation to the following themes: the politics and rationale for inscription of sites; the contradictory relationship between World Heritage and (mass)tourism/political economy, and finally, questions of World Heritage, citizenship and identity.