On the Jane’s walk there’s a staircase which was painted with murals. The over tourism caused by these murals and other attractions negatively impacted the neighborhood communities. The members of those communities got frustrated with how loud the tourists were as well as the littering, so they painted over the murals with gray. Even though the tourism in these communities has largely decreased the impacts that it had upon the culture and the communities has lasted.

One of the most important factors for locals regarding tourism is the cultural impacts it has in the area. In many neighborhoods it goes beyond just aesthetic changes and problems of noise and disrespect, tourism will result in gentrification. The effect of gentrification on the tourists visit ranges widely, sometimes even destroying the actual attraction. Usually when tourism has reached that point there is some sort of malformed forced culture which was artificially created for the satisfaction of the tourist. Such mockery of a culture unexpectedly is terrible for both parties, the tourists are left with a shadow the the past experience and the natives have their culture mocked, their people displaced, and their cities taken from them. Obviously one side bears the brunt of the burden. Because of the degradation of culture due to tourism’s vampirism, respect is necessary.

Mitigating the damage tourism has on culture can be difficult, however what we as individuals can do is respect their culture. By respecting the locals culture we do three things: understanding culture, stop imposing culture, and communicating with the locals. These three things are important to such a degree that rather than being a kind thing to do, they are rather an obligation.

Understanding

A baseline for all of proactivity is understanding, this allows us to act without in an informed and conscious manner, rather then trying to assume or guess customs. I’m rather sure that most would be ambivalent to minor infractions, however the decay forms on a larger scale. These infractions gradually wears away upon the how important people view norms in a culture. If every tourist disrespected norms with no consequence (unknowingly or willingly) both the tourists and the locals will start to care less about the tourists following the norm, and possibly care less about the norm in general.

Imposition of Culture

The power relations ship between a tourist and a local is not equal. Tourists recklessly consume and expect service, and despite our grievances many locals are reliant upon the economic drive fueled by tourism. As such we can impose culture and face little consequence. Imposing culture shifts the environment from one which displays culture and is comfortable for the locals to a sanitized masquerade of the original culture, which is in actuality simply a copy of the tourists culture. Complete absence of imposing our culture is impossible as we impose our culture regardless of intent, our actions permeate more than we see. To mitigate our impact we must put our time, energy, and money, into local norms and businesses. We must put our time and support into the real culture instead of the culture that exists simply for the tourist.

Communicating with the locals

(WIP)