Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
1 8
TOURISM SPACES, BEHAVIOURS
AND CULTURES
The metaspatialities of tourism
Petri Hottola
We may not always be aware of it, but our lives are constantly affected by a multitude of social
and cultural interrelations. Socially constructed norms, values and habits guide routine
behaviour in everyday situations. We negotiate our way through a tangled web of community
expectations while adapting to the norms or challenging them in order to fulfi l our indi-
vidual aspirations. An important goal is to be in
control
, or at least to achieve a perception of
being in control (Goffman, 1963; Langer, 1983), to know how to act in order to successfully
satisfy one's needs and desires, as far as is possible in the omnipresent interplay between the
self and the community.
The emerging theory of metaspatiality in tourism has created a new comprehensive frame-
work to analyse tourist behaviour and cultures in relation to space, particularly in connection
with tourist enclaves. This chapter explains the human need for control and its consequences
in short-term transitions in
Other
cultural environments; the behavioural tactics which tour-
ists and travellers employ to manage their intercultural work (culture confusion) and leisure
in a variety of tourist metaspaces. I argue that the interplay between control, cultural domi-
nance, reversal and extension also guides social interaction in tourist spaces - both public and
metaspatial; revealing new insights into the practice of tourism and challenging some current
theories on the human dimensions of tourism spaces.
Maintaining a satisfactory level of control over the imminent reality is one of the basic
human needs - a prerequisite of psychological well-being and therefore a much sought-after
state. In familiar surroundings, one knows how to walk from point A to point B to buy lunch,
or how to initiate interpersonal interaction. Abroad, we have an equally compelling need to
improve the predictability of our existence, but more effort is required to reach a positive
outcome, simply because we do not initially know what to do.
Travelling across cultural borders in tourism involves
culture confusion
(Hottola, 1999,
2004): the need to abandon our suddenly obsolete former knowledge (norms, routines) and
to adopt a locally appropriate way of acting, through a learning process of trial and error.
Culture confusion may, rarely, lead to
culture shock
(Oberg, 1960) - an acute depression.
However happy a tourist may be, the requirement for stress management is there to be dealt
with whenever people explore new territories. Also the pleasures of life eventually exhaust
one's resources and a period of rest is required. A wine-motivated tourist may eagerly explore
the local products in Stellenbosch, South Africa, but there is the one sip too many: a point
