Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
providing an expression of the unique costumes, music etc, of the culture that cre-
ated the event. At the most basic level the form of the festivity may be based simply
on one activity, one ritual or one artistic endeavour, such as a type of music that
dominates many small town festivals. At the most complicated level the larger fes-
tivals involve many activities with lavish spectacles, frequently with a parade as the
main event, with participants displaying rich, ornamented and sometimes outland-
ish costumes. Many use vestiges of the past, such as religious icons or traditional
costumes and musical instruments, to give them distinctiveness. Most are comple-
mented by music and dancing that add to the range of sights, sounds, and activities
in the urban places. The result is that places with these festive activities have more
complex and varied cultural characters than those without them. They add to their
vitality, prestige, often to their uniqueness, increasing the national and international
profile of the host towns and cities. The festivals become a focal part of their tourist
trade and with many towns deliberately choosing particular themes, or accepting
the form pioneered by some local group, often of quite a bizarre character, to be
distinctive from their neighbours. However the uniqueness of the forms may be
questioned. Some festivals, such as music festivals, are copied by other towns, or
are derived from similar origins, such as the Lenten festivals. In addition, as the
events become attractive to outside visitors, they often add successful elements
from other festivals to enhance their own offerings to create new experiences for
their spectators, which have the danger of reducing their uniqueness.
In recent years there has been a
questioning of the cultural authenticity
of many
of the forms and activities seen in contemporary festive events that are derived
from older traditions. There seems little doubt that many of the forms of the new
or revived festive events have been invented, or are seriously modified versions of
older traditions. Yet one must remember that all so-called 'authentic traditions' get
created at some point and are modified through time, so 'authentic' is always a con-
tested word. Indeed, many forms, that seem authentic to the contemporary observer
are nothing more than invented traditions of the late eighteenth century, based on
a romantic interpretation of older forms, as seen in a classic topic (Hobsbawn and
Ranger
1983
). Nevertheless, it does appear that many contemporary festivals now
function more as spectacles attempting to provide unique experiences, rather than
as events with symbolic meanings that can be linked to some prior rationale or func-
tion, whether seasonal or religious. But one must be careful in assuming a singular
result. Some researchers have claimed that many folkloric festivals are inauthentic
in the sense that they have invented or distorted the local historic traditions that
were part of the older cultures. Magliocco (
2001
) argued this point in relation to La
Cavalcata Sarda in Sardinia, a parade of local traditions that welcomed the King of
Italy to the island in 1899 and was revived as a tourist promotion for the Italian Ro-
tary Club conference in 1951. Others have suggested that this festival has fostered a
revival of community cohesion in recent years, based on the feelings of shared ori-
gin and cultural difference by participants that are manifested in the festive events,
providing an antidote to global homogenization (Araza and Crouch
2006
). Other
folkloric festivals have had a similar history and result, helping to re-invigorate or
re-invent local cultures, even in highly modified forms.
