Engendering Continuing and Reciprocal Tourism

- Intercultural Programmes

DEFINITIONS:

Continuing Tourism - Tourism that stimulates development of friendships encourages continued contact between locals & tourists after the tourist has returned home.

Reciprocal Tourism - A 2-way type of tourism. It specifically aims to encourage the tourist to act as host in return to the friends (s)he made when visiting another culture.

Intercultural - Between and about cultures. Eg.: Intercultural understanding - An education, derived from experience, about cultures and the ways they interact.

Human Social Commonalities - (HSC) Social characteristics that occur across cultures [such as the family environment, the desire for friendship and interest in other cultures]

OUTLINE

In this paper a way of utilising tourism's huge potential to stimulate better intercultural understanding is presented. It first examines the psychology behind travel, (drawing parallels with childhood learning), then uses these insights to develop a tourism programme which promotes friendship, intercultural learning & continuing contact between locals & tourists.

The programme is one of 'direct tourism', based on self-organisation between locals and tourists, in the conviction that it will therefore satisfy their mutual needs better than conventional tourism. It is designed to be easily replicable, not rely on any funding sources, and to make solid contributions to the local community in the form of educational resources.

Intercultural Programmes (IPs) as an example of such 'direct tourism' are presented generally. (Case studies from Transylvania and Kyrghyzstan will presented in a longer paper later). The critical role of E-mail and the NET is emphasised.

The benefits & drawbacks of such intimate and continuing tourism, are discussed.

It is proposed that using HSCs as the basis for tourism programmes allows a form of communication between cultures that is both adaptive and mutually respecting.

Such a form of communication may be fundamental to the survival of cultural diversity, for in a business dominated & technologically shrunk world, communication between cultures will occur but with little regard for their survival.

THE PSYCHOLOGY BEHIND TRAVEL

People travel for a mixture of hedonism, voyeurism & discovery. But it's worth a closer look at more fundamental psychology. Travel represents a voluntary displacement into a foreign environment that wrenches us out of the routine and confronts us with new possibilities. This attraction to the new is an excitement that dates back to childhood when we were learning about our surroundings. The foundation of childhood learning is play, which itself is fun. Thus newness has been associated with fun right from our formative years and it is the basic pull of holidaying.

But newness, or the unknown, is also characterised by fear & insecurity. In an unfamiliar environment, with much beyond our control, reassurances of a kind are what we seek. In the child these take the form of emotional support. In the tourist they are represented by information consistent with our perspective of security. It is suggested such information springs naturally from basing the tourism programme on HSCs.

Intercultural Programmes are an attempt at this and bridge the information & security gap which to an extent conventional tourism promotes and feeds upon. One of the key abilities IPs help to develop is intercultural empathy - the ability to see a situation from another culture's viewpoint.

INTERCULTURAL PROGRAMMES (IPs)

An IP is basically a friendship programme specifically designed to use tourism to develop lasting friendships across cultures, a tourist market that is reletively untapped.

They provide: others interested in making friends; a host family environment for the tourist to live in and a locally guided understanding of the culture and geography that they would be unlikely to get if on a conventional hotel based holiday. Contributions to the local community are made in the form of English teaching and educational resources.

The IP is run by an unpaid working group composed of local teachers, students and parents. They write an advert which describes the philosophy of the IP, gives information about the local cultural history & geography, provides logistical data about: board; lodging; English teaching schedules; etc... and sends it by E-mail to University Careers Advisory Services and WWW NET sites. English speaking 'tourists' apply by E-mail, the working group selects the most appropriate, and then pairs them with aspiring host families. The whole programme is organised by E-mail.

Most importantly the working group provides a base for continuing the IP in future years, takes responsibility for the IP, acts as a contact point for communications and a forum for discussions, spreads the load of organising, deals with any problems, and gives the IP credibility.

In the first year IPs need a partnership between the local working group and a facilitator who has university, NET and tourism contacts in the tourists' countries of origin and who is trained in local NGO development work. The facilitator trains the working group up in: E-mail, project management and organisation.

English teaching is simply a tool to encourage cultural interaction. It is not an ideal tool but one that is much in demand by the local community and one that gives access to a wide range of tourists from different cultures.

The strength of the IP is that it is as personable as possible. Direct tourist to family contact. This closeness, it is hoped, will stimulate C&R tourism. (Methods of enabling Continuing & Reciprocal Tourism will be discussed in the longer paper later).

CONCLUSION

C&R tourism may have a future if promoted as a way to really learn about another culture. By investing in a C&R tourism programme locals & tourists have the opportunity to learn way beyond the initial holiday meeting. The continued contact will in fact provide the bulk of the learning especially if taken as far as Reciprocal Tourism.

English teaching is only one of many such catylysts that enable C&R tourism. Some kind of contribution to the local community is the key ingredient. It is very important, however, to place the emphasis on developing firendships, not on getting some community project done.

The benefits have been discussed already whether real or potential.

Some potential drawbacks may be:

- Using English teaching as the oil for the programme may simply be spreading English-speaking culture. A cynic might even suggest it simply prepares the ground for English-speaking businesses.

- The intimacy of C&R tourism only accelerates cultural erosion. The tourist's culture is often a more aggressive one than the cultures they are visiting.

C&R tourism & IPs are based on the belief that:

- Communication between cultures, if adaptive and mutually respecting, is beneficial.

- Friendships between cultures provides a better intercultural understanding than that afforded by the media.

- Incorporating HSCs into the programme will provide an atmosphere that engenders C&R tourism.

QUESTIONS

- How to avoid drastic cultural erosion given that communication between cultures will occur ?

- How to include C&R tourism within a wider cultural & developmental education ?

- How can tourism ever realistically contribute to a greater mutual respect that is reflected in actions, and a wider understanding of global happenings - given that it is the domain of a few, ie. the rich ?

BIOGRAPHY

The author has facilitated an IP in Transylvania ('97) and Kyrgyzstan ('98). Prior to this he worked for Oxfam for 4 years helping advise projects in Africa. He has travelled widely.