Hawaii: Waikiki – Laie

The epitome of scholarly involvement in a staged tourist attraction can be found in the Polynesian Cultural Center, located in the small community of Laie, an hour’s drive from the prime Hawaiian tourist destination of Waikiki. It is a recreation of Polynesian cultures which is owned and operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, commonly known as the Mormons. The center was established with a threefold purpose, according to Stanton (1989), the purposes are:

        i.            to preserve the culture of the Polynesians;

      ii.            to provide employment for students of Brigham Young University- Hawaii Campus;

    iii.            to provide direct financial aid to BYU-Hawaii.

It is the “reconstruction of the exotic, more popular elements of Polynesia and puts “on stage” for the visitors selected aspects of Polynesian life”. In addition to showing aspects of Hawaiian culture, it also illustrates the material culture performing  arts of other Polynesian cultures, bringing employees from Fiji, Tahiti, Samoa, and Tonga to demonstrate their culture. This tourist attraction fulfills the cultural tourism expectations of most visitors and has become the second most popular tourist attraction in Hawaii. Also an important place from the community’s point of view, that the center has increased the income and material welfare of Laie without interfering with the daily lives of the people. “Students attend grade school, a college functions effectively. The bank opens and closes, in general, people work away from the prying eyes of the tourist”.

Other Example (Contd.......)

As a manifestation of this new approach, the Balinese Regional Government launched the Bali Arts Festival in 1979 at the opening of a new Arts Centre in Denpasar. Since its inception this month-long festival  has been regarded by the Balinese as evidence of the Island’s cultural renaissance, yet ‘it would be mistaken to consider this event as primarily a tourist attraction as over the years it has proved so popular with the Balinese that they make up nowadays the major part of its public’ (Picard, 1993; Yamashita’s Interview). Many of the offerings at the annual festival could not be termed traditional under the anthropological definition of something old, something performed in its traditional physical setting with its age-old values and purposes intact; but they are indisputably of Balinese origin, drawing upon the long continuous history of Balinese creative expression and, as such, they are authentically Balinese.

While responding about cultural tourism in Bali, Shinji Yamashita says, “up to now, tourism has always been considered negatively in relation to culture-the argument is that development of tourism destroys traditional culture. However, the destruction of traditional culture cannot reattributed solely to the development of tourism; this argument makes the mistake of idealizing traditional culture, as though it has been handed down unchanged from ancient times. In bali tourism stimulated traditional culture and influenced new cultural creativity.

Since Balinese tourism relies upon Balinese culture, if tourism were to destroy Balinese culture it would destroy Balinese tourism. The result is that the Balinese, having been compelled to define their cultural heritage, in the process have put tourism to work for Bali rather than the Balinese working for tourism. The key difference in the analyses of Picard (1995) and McKean (1989) lies in their emic approach, as distinct from the etic approach of many others. This conclusion recalls Wilson’s (1981; in Sofield) insistence that tourism analyses will benefit by ‘a thoroughly empirical research strategy which seeks hermeneutic understanding in terms of the knowledge possessed by the participants themselves-their definitions, goals, strategies, decisions, and the perceived consequences of their actions’. It includes their ‘on-going symbolic construction of tradition and authenticity’ (Wood, 1993: in Sofield).

While citing the views of American cultural analyst James Clifford, Yamashita does not agree to keep traditional culture in a museum. According to James Clifford, modern ethnographic histories oscillate between two metanarratives, or narratives about narratives: one of homogenization or loss, the other of emergence invention. In homogenization or loss idea is that lesser cultures will be assimilated and driven to extinction by stronger and more dominant cultures. The emergence or invention idea is the opposite; it highlights the act that cultures are fluid, and are capable of joining with other cultures or of diversifying and being reorganized. Under this idea cultures do not die out, but are in a continual process of creation. Today’s indigenous cultures exist within global political and economic systems; we need to think in terms of creation of cultures in new conditions, not of extinction. This is a period of globalization, and we should expert that indigenous cultures will move across borders and mix. The example of Bali shoes us that tourism can play an important role in the creation; as well as Bali, this has been observed at many other places in the world, including my country, Japan (Shinji Yamashita).

Other Example

Another example of the ‘imposed etic’ (Bery, 1990; in Sofield) may be found with reference to Bali, where numerous analyses have criticized tourism as a destructive agent of change (Hanna, 1972; in Sofield, 2000). However, the research of Picard (1995) and McKean (1989) inter alia, both working independently in Bali over a twenty-year period, demonstrates that by using a more actor-oriented (emic) approach the interrelationship between tourism change and culture change cannot be viewed as a ‘one-way street’; the host communities adapt to and in turn modify that tourism which takes place within their social space. Picard has termed this ‘touristic culture’: through tourism, culture has been transformed into the main economic resource of Bali and by the same token Balinese culture has become a major bargaining point with the central Indonesian Government, tourism authorities and tourist operators (Picard, 1993; in Sofield).

Picard chronicled the way in which the Balinese elite responded to the imposition of a tourism development plan from Jakarta which was based on an ‘outsider’ view of their culture by defining and refining in a comprehensive way their ‘Balinese-ness’. Over a period of eighty years, from 1971 to 1979, they held a series of seminars under the joint auspices of the Directorate General of Culture and the Directorate General of Tourism which resulted in the formulation of the ‘doctrine of cultural tourism’ for Bali and the signing of an agreement between the two Directorates General. This established the Balinese Commission of Cooperation for the Promotion and Development of Cultural Tourism (Komisi Kerjasama Pembinaan dan Pengembangan Wisata Budaya) whose chief objectives were to:

        i.            increase and extend the use of culture for the development of tourism; and

      ii.            to use the proceeds of tourism development for the promotion and development of culture.

Sanger’s Example

Sanger (1988; Hitchcock 1993; in Sofield, 2000) provides an example of the interface between tourism and traditional culture with an emic analysis of changes to the barong dance dramas of the village of Singapadu in Bali. Barong performances have been adapted in a variety of ways to suit tourist needs. They have been shortened from more than three hours to about one hour. They include new sequences and slapstick moments which transcend linguistic boundaries to enhance enjoyment for tourists. Women have been introduced to play female roles which traditionally only men had played. Trance sequences with Kris (daggers) and the eating of live chickens have been omitted because of tourist disapproval (Sofield).

However, the villagers have not interpreted these changes in terms of cultural denigration (Sanger, 1988; in Sofield, 2000). First, they have maintained the traditional prayers and offerings at the beginning of each performance and continue to treat the barong with great respect. Second, the oldest and holiest barong costume is not used for commercial performances so it is not desecrated. Third, the villagers maintain that the baring likes to dance whatever the circumstances. Fourth, ‘ownership’ of the barong provides a resource which the villagers can utilize for much-needed cash income and, since the tourist revenue is distributed communally, the charge of individual greed is inaccurate. Finally, the barong reinforces community solidarity in much the same way as the vilavilairevo of Fiji and Sanger records that during the monsoons the villagers miss the opportunity it provides to come together during the tourist season. In this instance, commoditization of culture may be reversed and considered as a process of ‘culturising commercialism’, since local traditions have not been modified in culturally acceptable ways. ‘Original’ traditions now exist with ‘new’ traditions in the same time and space and ‘touristic culture is very much part of the reality’.

Bali

Bali first became a tourist site in the 1920s. In 1930 the American traveler Hickman Powell published Bali: The last paradise, recounting the island during the 1920s. There was also a film of the same name, which was made in the 1930s. From that time through to the present day the image of paradise has remained unchanged and still features in travel brochures.

Model Cultural Tourism: Bali and Hawaii

In different parts of the world tourism receiving countries have developed several types of model cultural centers like Williamsburg, Plymouth Plantation, Old Sturbridge Village, and Mystic Seaport in the United States, as well as in many folk museums of Europe. This is a kind of reconstruction of a historic past. These turn time back a century or two, affording a scale against which visitors can measure progress, and be reminded of the hardships encountered by their forebears. Many are also “living museums” where school children may spend a day or two and learn firsthand history. In addition to Hawaii’s Polynesian Cultural Center, other ethnographic models include Fiji’s Orchid Island, Bangkok’s Rose Garden-Thailand in Miniature, and korea’s Folk Village. Smaller versions operate in cities such as Jakarta, Manila, and Cairo. Popular and profitable, these models appear to meet the ethnic expectations of the tourist. Although only a reconstruction of the life-style they had hoped to observe, these models offer a more accurate ethnographic view than is reflected in the modern native culture, and allow the visitor the freedom to wander and photograph at will. Model cultures also offer another distinct advantage, especially at tourist sites where the physical presence of humans may cause damage. The actual Paleolithic caves of Lascaux (France) with their world-renowned polychrome paintings are now closed to the public to prevent exfoliation of the paint. However, the surrogate display is in some ways more graphic than the original. Similarly, the Viking settlement at L’ Anseaux meadows in northern Newfoundland would have been destroyed by visitors tramping through the archaeological pits, but now-reconstructed village provides a fine interpretive center that documents the Viking ventures into the New World, and fully merits its number one rank on the United Nation’s World Patrimony list. Even the spread of popular fantasies, in the Disneylands of Tokyo and Paris, provide forms of model cultures for “children of all ages” for they too have internal “theme villages” and fairy-tale motifs.

Further construction of model cultures is to be expected and should be warmly received as long as the models remain reasonably accurate. Model cultures have the great advantage of structuring tourist visits to a site away from the daily lives of ordinary people.

Souvenir

As camera is the identity batch of the tourist so the souvenirs are tangible evidences of travel that are often shared with family and friends, but what one really brings back are memories of experiences. As Carpenter (1973) puts it so well that the connection between symbol and things come from the fact that the symbol-the word or picture (or artifact)-helps give the “thing” its identity clarity definition. It helps convert given reality into experienced reality, and is therefore an indispensable part of all experience. Souvenirs, derived from the Latin word subvenire, which means ‘to come to mind’ are an important symbolic adjunct to the tourist industry, providing the tourist with something tangible to take home while simultaneously providing local employment in an arts and crafts industry (Smith, 1989). Similarly, the term vacation is also derived from Latin word vacare that means ‘to leave (one’s house) empty’. But, now the term ‘vacation’ is used as ‘to go off to work’ which has become key concept for modern tourism.

Typology

The same author has proposed a typology of the “portable arts” for cross-cultural analysis (1) functional fine arts, which have great contemporary cultural significance to the people themselves, comparable to Balinese offerings and temple carvings; (2) commercial fine arts, made for sale to a specialized audience of patrons for connoisseurs, analogous to tapestries hung in Balinese places or ornamental carvings decorating the homes of the wealthy; (3) souvenir arts, made for sale to a wider audience, which in Bali include inexpensive carvings, paintings, masks, cloths, and jewelry; and (4) assimilated fine arts, including those attempts to copy or use the traditional arts of the outsiders by whom they are being influenced. The abstract paintings by the young painters of Ubud who use “western” colors and canvases, as well as styles to paint Balinese landscapes, fighting cocks, and portraits – or weavers who make tablecloths with Balinese designs on imported looms reflect this category. Graburn acknowledge that the typology poses some problems of classification, as with the Canadian Eskimo soapstone of dollars to the inexpensive, mediocre, hurriedly – done work of less careful craftsmen, which is “souvenir art”. A comparable range also occurs in Bali Graburn (1969) discusses the phenomenon of “airport art”.

Graburn’s Classification

Graburn (1982) has proposed a classification of such art forms, starting with the assumption that at some time, there exist a traditional or functional art tradition on which is made for internal consumption according to the methods and aesthetic rules of the society. It can be briefly followed the possible evolution away from such embedded arts, under the forces of tourism and change, into other forms of arts and crafts such as commercial replicas, souvenir and novelties, reintegrated arts, popular arts and assimilated arts. The authenticity of these different forms depends not on how closely they adhere to traditional forms, but on how they are honestly represented to the relatively ignorant tourists. The ultimate authentic arts are of course these embedded, often sacred and symbolic forms. One final category of arts and crafts, which is emerging all over the world, is what Graburn has called assimilated arts. These are the artistic efforts of people, often-ethnic minorities, to work in the medium of someone else’s traditions, often in international art media such as painting or instrumental music. Key examples would include Australian aborigine watercolor painting, American Indian poster and oil painting, Canadian Eskimo printmaking, Japanese abstract expressionist works, West African boutique, Zambian sculptures and so on. Again these are quite authentic of their own kind, though they are new hybrid in traditions are being copied. Authenticity is slighted only when we people told that they are old traditions, or even that the exploratory “borrowing” group does not in fact create them. These works too have in some instances become tourist arts and some have even ended up in museums, appreciated for their artistic value and norms on the basis of how old the tradition is or isn’t. If the tourism products decline in quality, this will ultimately result in a decline in the tourism economy.

Graburn’s Description

Graburn (1989) has described other societies in which the production of art for heightened self- identity and self-value and has encouraged appreciation of indigenous craft and creativity. Analyzing the carving of Canadian and Alaskan Eskimos, the Maori community of New Zealand and the Kamba of Kenya, Graburn has suggested that “special economic relationship” may develop wherein a small-scale society uses its special skills to its advantage, surpassing the efforts of the larger society: “The Eskimos know that the white man cannot or will not carve soapstone as well as they can. The same might be said of Navajo jewelry and Maori woodcarving.”

The souvenir market and by extension the entire structure of everyday reality in the modern world depends on the perpetuation of authentic attractions which themselves are not for sale (MacCannell, 1976). While the sight itself constitutes the moment greatest intensity, as MacCannell goes on to say, returning with souvenirs validates and prolongs the experience. Youth tourists, especially the non-conventional ones, referred to in the literature as “drifter”, “wanderers” or travelers, one frequently exempts from such criticism. Then experiences are assumed to be more deeply into the host society than do mass tourists to avoid staged tourist settings (Cohen, 1982).

Arts and Authenticity

Authenticity means truth, central of the ultimate “truths” that modern tourists search for outside of their rather superficial home lives. Authenticity, on the other hand, refers to another kind of truth, it means that things really are what they are said to be the opposite of authenticity is not “new” or “souvenir” but “fake” or “misrepresented”, though these two often go together under the influence of commercialism. Arts and handicrafts are an important attraction for tourists and can be a significant source of income for residents of the tourism area. Tourism can also be useda technique for revitalizing and maintaining. It is important to make a distinction between souvenir items and true arts and crafts, realizing that both have a role to perform in tourism. The authenticity of local arts and crafts should be retained in terms of use of local materials, designs and crafts skills. However, designs can often be modified to suit the interests of tourists. Special training may be required of local artists and craftsmen and sales outlets organized, with quality controls applied. Traditional dance, music and drama can also be of much interest to tourists and require special organization and sometimes development of specialized performance facilities. Maintaining authenticity of these performances is important and may require that training programs be established and quality controls applied. Many people confuse authentic with traditional when thinking about arts, crafts, costume, architecture and so on. But “traditional” is a flexible concept and as we have already seen it is constantly under reformulation in any living society: it is only under the influence of museumification that tradition becomes labeled and static. Let us examine for a moment the different ways in which things could be not authentic applying more to arts and crafts than to architecture.

Principle 6

Tourism promotion programmes should protect and enhance Natural and Cultural Heritage characteristics.

6.1 Tourism promotion programmes should create realistic expectations and responsibly inform potential visitors of the specific heritage characteristics of a place or host community, thereby encouraging them to behave appropriately.

6.2 Places and collections of heritage significance should be promoted and managed in ways which protect their authenticity and enhance the visitor experience by minimizing fluctuations in arrivals and avoiding excessive numbers of visitors at any one time.

6.3 Tourism promotion programmes should provide a wider distribution of benefits and relieve the pressures on more popular places by encouraging visitors to experience the wider cultural and natural heritage characteristics of the region or locality.

6.4 The promotion, distribution and sale of local crafts and other products should provide a reasonable social and economic return to the host community, while ensuring the their cultural integrity is not degraded.

Principle 5

Tourism and conservation should benefit the host community.

5.1 Policy makers should promote measures for the equitable distribution of the benefits of tourism to be shared across countries or regions, improving the levels of socio-economic development and contributing where necessary to poverty alleviation.

5.2 Conservation management and tourism activities should provide equitable economic, social and cultural benefits to the men and women of the host or local community, at all levels, through education, training and the creation of full employment opportunities.

5.3 A significant proportion of the revenue specifically derived from tourism programmes to heritage places should be allotted to the protection, conservation and presentation of those places, including their natural and cultural contexts. Where possible, visitors should be advised of this revenue allocation.

5.4 Tourism programmes should encourage the training and employment of guides and site interpreters from the host community to enhance the skills of local people in the presentation and interpretation of their cultural values.

5.5 Heritage interpretation and education programmes among the people of the host community should encourage the involvement of local site interpreters. The programmes should promote a knowledge and respect for their heritage, encouraging the local people to take a direct interest in its care conservation.

5.6 Conservation management and tourism programmes should include education and training opportunities for policy makers, planners, researchers, designers, architects, interpreters, conservators and tourism operators. Participants should be encouraged issues, opportunities and problems encountered by their colleagues.

Principle 4

Host communities and indigenous peoples should be involved in planning for conservation and tourism.

4.1 The rights and interest of the host community, at regional and local levels, property owners and relevant indigenous peoples who may exercise traditional rights or responsibilities over their own land and its significant sites, should be respected. They should be involved in establishing goals, strategies, policies and protocols for the identification, conservation, management, presentation and interpretation of their resources, cultural practices and contemporary cultural expressions, in the tourism context.

4.2 While the heritage of any specific place or region may have a universal dimension, the needs and wishes of some communities or indigenous peoples to restrict or manage physical, spiritual or intellectual access to certain cultural practices, knowledge, beliefs, activities artifacts or sites should be respected.

Principle 3

Conservation and Tourism Planning for Heritage Places should ensure that the Visitor Experience will be Worthwhile, Satisfying and Enjoyable.

3.1   Conservation and tourism programmes should present high quality information to optimize the visitor’s understanding of the significant heritage characteristics and of the need for their protection, enabling the visitor to enjoy the place in an appropriate manner.

3.2     Visitors should be able to experience the heritage place at their own pace, if they so choose. Specific circulation routes may be necessary to minimize impacts on the integrity and physical fabric of a place, its natural and cultural characteristics.

3.3     Respect for the sanctity of spiritual places, practices and traditions are an important consideration for site managers, visitors, policy makers, planners and tourism operators. Visitors should be encouraged to behave as welcomed guests, respecting the values and lifestyles of the host community, rejecting possible theft or illicit trade in cultural property and conducting them in a responsible manner which generates a renewed welcome, should they return.

3.4     Planning for tourism activities should provide appropriate facilities for the comfort, safety and well being of the visitor that chance the enjoyment of the visit but do not adversely impact on the significant features or ecological characteristics.

Principle 2

The relationship between Heritage Places and Tourism is dynamic and may involve conflicting values. It should be managed in a sustainable way for present and future generations.

2.1 Places of heritage significance have an intrinsic value for all people as an important basis for cultural diversity and social development. The long term protection and conservation of living cultures, heritage places, collections, their physical and ecological integrity and their environmental contexts, should be an essential component of social, economic, political, legislative, culture and tourism development policies.

2.2 The interaction between heritage resources or values and tourism is dynamic and ever changing, generating opportunities and challenges, as well as potential conflicts. Tourism projects, activities and developments should achieve positive outcomes and minimize adverse impacts on the heritage and lifestyles of the host community, while responding to the needs and aspirations of the visitor.

2.3 Conservation, interpretation and tourism development programmes should be based on a comprehensive understanding of the specific, but often complex or conflicting aspects of heritage significance of the particular place. Continuing research and consultation are important to furthering the evolving understanding and appreciation of that significance.       

2.4 The retention of the authenticity of heritage places and collections is important. It is an essential element of their cultural significance, as expressed in the physical material, collected memory and intangible traditions that remain from the past. Programmes should present and interpret the authenticity of places and cultural experiences to enhance the appreciation and understanding of the cultural heritage.

2.5 Tourism development and infrastructure projects should take account of the aesthetic, social and cultural dimensions, natural and cultural landscapes, bio-diversity characteristics and the broader visual context of heritage places. Preference should be given to using local materials and take account of local architectural styles or vernacular traditions.

2.6 Before heritage places are promoted or developed for increased tourism, management plans should assess the natural and cultural values of the resource. They should then establish appropriate limits of acceptable change, particularly in relation to the impact of visitor numbers on the physical characteristics, integrity, ecology and biodiversity of the place, local access and transportation systems and the social, economic and cultural well being of the host community. If the likely level of change is unacceptable the development proposal should be modified.

2.7 There should be on-going programmes of evaluation to assess the progressive impacts of tourism activities and development on the particular place or community.

Principles of the Cultural Tourism

Principles of the Cultural Tourism Charter The 12^th General Assembly of the International Cultural Tourism ICOMOS (International Council on Monuments and Sites) Charter Managing Tourism at Places of Heritage Significance 1999 (Sarika Rai, 2003)

Principle 1

Since domestic and international tourism is among the foremost vehicles for cultural exchange, conservation should provide responsible and well managed opportunities for members of the host community and visitors to experience and understand that community’s and visitors to experience and understand that community’s heritage and culture at first hand.

1.1   The natural and cultural heritage is a material and spiritual resource, providing a narrative development. It has an important role in modern life and should be made physically, intellectually and/or emotively accessible to the general public. Programmes for the protection and conservation of the physical attributes, intangible aspects, contemporary cultural expressions and broad context, should facilitate an understanding and appreciation of the heritage significance by the host community and the visitor, in an equitable and affordable manner.

1.2   Individual aspects of natural and cultural heritage have differing levels of significance, some with universal values, and others of national regional or local importance. Interpretation programmes should present that significance in a relevant and accessible manner to the host community and the visitor, with appropriate, stimulating and contemporary forms of education, media, technology and personal explanation of historical, environmental and cultural information.

1.3   Interpretation and presentation programmes should facilitate and encourage the high level f public awareness and support necessary for the long term survival of the natural and cultural heritage.

1.4   Interpretation programmes should present the significance of heritage places, traditions and cultural practices within the past experience and present diversities of the area and the host community, including that of minority cultural or linguistic groups. The visitor should always be informed of the differing cultural values that may be ascribed to a particular heritage resource.

Revitalization Process (Contd......)

a)      The period of cultural distortion:

This period is characterized by piecemeal attempts to restore equilibrium and so reduce stress, and the conflict between community members that is now being expressed. Special interest groups emerge, either seeking a restoration of previous ways, an establishment of a new consensus, or some other form of adaptation. Generally however, such effects are initially ineffective.

b)     The period of revitalization:

This take place with the realization that the community’s culture is maladaptive but for the society to be successful a number of changes must occur. From the processes of cultural distortion, there must arise a ‘blueprint’ for a ‘better’ society, i.e. one which reduces stress. This new ‘blueprint’ acquires followers who both defend and enforce the new code. The movement must also be routinised so that the new culture can establish its own methods for handling change.

c)      The new steady state:

This occurs when social disorganization and personal stress return to tolerable levels and a new dynamic equilibrium is evolved.

Revitalization Process

According to Wallace (1956; in Ryan), societies can be subjected to a revitalization process which consists of five stages, although there is no guarantee that any society will exhibit  all five stages, or indeed experience them in the order he suggests. The stages are:

a)      The steady state:

Social and cultural forces in a dynamic equilibrium, whereby change does take place, but does so within the internal dynamics of the society, which thus retains its integrity and is able to handle processes that may cause stress.

b)     The period of increased individual stress:

The society has been pushed out of equilibrium due to some external event. From our viewpoint, such an event can be the developmental of tourism. The previous existing cultural system can no longer satisfy the needs of all of its members. The opportunities and demonstration effects of tourism may create a process of conflict within individuals as they seek to reconcile the developing changes with a framework of values that relates to a previous social and cultural setting.

Interaction between Cultural Heritage and Tourism

Domestic and international tourism continues to be among the foremost vehicles for cultural exchange, providing a personal experience, not only of that which has survived from the past, but of the contemporary life and society of others. It is increasingly appreciated as a positive force for natural and cultural conservation. Tourism can capture the economic characteristics of the heritage and harness these for conservation by generating funding, education the community and influencing policy. It is an essential part of many national and regional economies and can be an important factor in development, when managed successfully.

Tourism itself has become an increasingly complex phenomenon, with political, economic, social, cultural, educational, bio-physical, ecological and aesthetic dimensions. The achievement of a beneficial inter-action between the potentially conflicting expectations and aspirations of visitors and host or local communities, presents many challenges and opportunities.

The Charter Ethos

At the broadest level, the natural and cultural heritage belongs to all people. We each have a right and responsibility to understand, appreciate and conserve its universal values.

At a time of increasing globalization, the protection, conservation, interpretation and presentation of the heritage and cultural diversity of any particular place or region is an important challenge for people everywhere. However, management of the heritage, within a framework of internationally recognized and appropriately applied standards, is usually the responsibility of the particular community or custodian group.

A primary objective for managing heritage is to communicate its significance and need for its conservation to its host community and to visitors. Reasonable and well managed physical, intellectual and/or emotive assess to heritage and cultural development is both a right and a privilege. It brings with it a duty of respect for the heritage values, interests and equity of the present-day host community, indigenous custodians or owners of historic property and for the landscapes and cultures from which that heritage evolved.

Heritage Tourism

By definition, heritage is a tradition that inherits from one generation to another. Heritage is a broad concept and includes the natural as well as the cultural environment. It encompasses landscapes, historic places, sites and built environment, as well as biodiversity, collections, past and continuing cultural practices, knowledge and living experiences. It records and expresses the long processes of historic development, forming the essence of diverse national, regional, indigenous and local identities and is an integral part of modern life. It is a dynamic reference point and positive instrument for growth and change. The particular heritage and collective memory of each locality or community is irreplaceable and an important foundation for development, both now and into the future.

Heritage is our legacy from the past, what we live today, and what we pass on to future generations. Our cultural and natural heritages are both irreplaceable sources of life and inspiration. World Heritage is the designation for places on earth that are of outstanding universal value to humanity and as such, have been inscribed on the World Heritage.

Tourism should bring benefits to host communities and provide and important means and motivation for them to care for and maintain their heritage and cultural practices. The involvement and co-operation of local and/or indigenous community representatives, conservationists, tourism operators, property owners, policy makers, those preparing national development plans and site managers is necessary to achieve a sustainable tourism industry and enhance the protection of heritage resources for future generations.