The document discusses heritage tourism and opportunities for conservation geography. It notes that heritage is everywhere and always present, with the "now" being when heritage is created and the "before" referring to the past which confirms what was created in the present. The document critiques narrow research on heritage tourism and calls for new ideas and methods. It examines traditional approaches to defining heritage and geography in the context of tourism. Word clouds are presented analyzing conference calls for papers relating to geography, tourism and heritage. Themes that emerged include landscape and place, food, sound, globalization, race/ethnicity and everyday life. Abstracts from a heritage tourism symposium are also analyzed without mentions of "heritage" or "tour

1. Now More Than Before!
Exciting Themes in the
Geography of Heritage
Tourism
Alan A. Lew
Northern Arizona University
Alanlew.com
Tourism and Heritage: Opportunities
and Challenges for Conservation Geography
International Geographical Union Pre-Conference Symposium
10–13 November 2011
Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Valparaiso, Chile

2. Heritage is Everywhere…
 And Always Present
 Now More than Before
 The Now = a Moment in Time when Heritage is Created
 The Before = The Past = The Confirmation of what was
Created in the Now Moment
“…we cannot avoid remaking our heritage,
for every act of recognition alters what survives.”
David Lowenthal, The Past is a Foreign Country (1982)

3. Heritage Tourism Research
 Complaints: Narrow Range of Heritage Tourism
Research
 Exotic locations & exception places and objects
 Little scope for transference to other contexts
 Limited range of methodologies
 Repeated use without challenge
 Similar to critiques of tourism
research in general
 Calls to Avoid:
 Standard explanations, Accepted
analyses (safety)
 Need to Engage:
 New ideas, Novel methods, (Risk)

4. Traditional Approaches
 (A) “History” as the chronological and verifiable past
-vs-
“Heritage” as a mediated outcome of selected facts and fantasies
 (B) Social Science “what and why”
-vs- Business “how to”
 (C) Heritage to achieve:
 - Economic Activities
- Political Agendas
- Place Identities
 (D) Heritage as a form of:
1. Structural and Institutional Control - Contestation and Dialogue
over Heritage
2. Commodification and Consumption - Heritage as Tourism
3. Existential Experience - Role Construction and Person
Transformation by Consuming Nostalgia

5. Definitions
 Heritage
 “Virtually anything by which
some kind of link, however
tenuous or false, may be forged
with the past.”
(Johnson & Thomas 1995: 170)
 Buildings, Ceremonies, Customs, Literature, Art, Pl
aces, “Things”
 Geography
 “…ways in which space, place and the environment
participate in an unfolding dialogue of meaning …
[including how they] are perceived and represented
…” (Shurmer-Smith 2002: 3)
 Location, Spatial patterns, Sense of
place, Landscape as text

6. Like Geography,
Heritage is Everywhere
 “All at once heritage is everywhere – in the
news, in the movies, in the marketplace – in
everything from galaxies to genes.”
 David Lowenthal, The Heritage Crusade and the Spoils of History (1996)

7. Geography and Heritage Tourism
Word Clouds
 UrbGeog – EconomicGeography – CulturalGeog – LeftGeog –
TRINET – TourismGeography – and others…
 > 100 CFP‟s – mostly AAG and IBG/RGS
 32 Selected Heritage-Related CFP‟s - 1 Sept to 31 Oct 2011
 Categories:
1. Landscape and Place (9 CFPs)
2. Food (4 CFPs)
3. Sound (2 CFPs)
4. Globalization (5 CFPs)
5. Race and Ethnicity (3 CFPs)
6. The Everyday (4 CFPs)
Others: Consumption (2 CFPs) & Experience (2 CFPs) & Waste (1 CFP)
 150 most frequent words (excluding common words)

8. All 32 Geography & Tourism CFPs

9. Place and
Landscape
Themes

10. Food
Themes

11. Sound Themes

12. Globalization
Themes

13. Race &
Ethnicity
Themes

14. Everyday Themes

15. Valparaiso Symposium’s
34 Abstracts

16. Our 34 Abstracts w/o „Heritage‟ & „Tourism‟

17. A Few Other Themes (AAG 2011)
- Multicultural Peoples
- City Branding
- Ethical Geographic Practice
- Resilient Places and Privileged Places

18. Key Concepts

19. Heritage is Everywhere…
 And Always Present
 Now More than Before
 The Now = a Moment in Time when Heritage is Created
 The Before = The Past = The Confirmation of what was
Created in the Now Moment
“…we cannot avoid remaking our heritage,
for every act of recognition alters what survives.”
David Lowenthal, The Past is a Foreign Country (1982)

21. Key Concepts