Colonialism, Globalization, Modernization, McDonaldization; all things that are often seen as positive and are often in our CAP textbooks. While reading through our Geography 122 textbook this past week, the question of whether or not globalisation is having a truly positive effect on our world managed to stump my mind.

Let me explain.

The modern world has seen an increase in global flows both in people and ‘stuff’. While money, emails, skype calls and many more things are easily spanning the world, people are not only country jumping for business but for pleasure. Tourism has quickly become a major impactor of the economic status of many countries. We have seen an entire country’s wealth increased once someone declares their country the new hot spot for vacation; Greece and Thailand for example. While this is a positive change and it is bettering the living situation of many people, the good cannot come without some bad.

If we look at these developing countries we can see that there is the ever present western influence on what they sell and how they try and operate. I had a teacher who has visited 44 countries and regularly took students on tours of the not as popular tourist destinations like Egypt, Peru, Brazil, and China. While in China they went on a hike which required them to take a plane to a remote location, bus to the small rural town that did not have electricity, walk a few kilometers to the hikes start and then make their way up the mountain. When they reached the top there was a man crouching over a small plastic bucket that held those red cans of Coke. Now as impressive as it is that they man carried them up the hill, and as accommodating as it was, those cans of Coke were as out of place as the students! Those cans not only represent the fantastic marketing job of Coke and its ability to reach places that do not have television or internet, but it also represents the need for locals to present something that is familiar to tourists otherwise they will not make a profit.

While this may have just been a Coke can, we can see that other western normalities are infiltrating many travel destinations. While many may overlook this and not care, we have to see the negative in this. By demanding a certain level of service or certain products and brands to be in the country, we are requiring the native country to leave behind its traditional culture to cater to western needs. If they do not provide the things tourists require to have the ‘comfortable’ stay they will have less and less tourism, which will eventually end with them in a bit of a financial crisis.

The Geography 122 textbook, in a section written by geographer Philip Crang, explains, “[Mosaics] are both an arena within which those locals can be recognized (world awareness allows a comparison between places and alerts us to their differences) and the site of forces that can destroy local uniqueness (through the invasion of non-local things and people (24).” I feel this reiterates my point about tourism and creates some controversy over the use of a mosaic to describe the world, or domestically how we describe Canada. If Canada considers itself the mosaic to America’s melting pot, are we doing the same thing to immigrants and their cultures just in a much slower and gradual process?

In a less dramatic sense, this tourist cultural imperialism is like the colonialism/ assimilation of the First Nations by British and French. The explorers, fur traders and colonialists came to Canada and forced the First Nations to change/ forget their traditions, culture, hunting rituals, etc. in order to be more ‘normal’, but really the Europeans were the abnormal ones. Without the help of the First Nations the fur traders would not have been so successful, they would not have had enough people to properly battle other groups and they would not have been able to sustain their population (the Métis). Yet once they were done with the First Nations they took to assimilating them through Residential Schools which effectively scarred the entire culture.

When we travel to other countries we want to see the local cultural things in order to feel like we are actually on vacation, yet when we go to restaurants we are wary of anything that is too far outside our comfort zone, and we do not want to sleep in a traditional hut, we want the five star resort with the full bed and bath. It is in this way that we are using the countries for what they provide us, and needing them to change their culture to better reflect one that we westerners are comfortable in.

While this all sounds like I am discouraging tourism, I’m not. I just believe tourism can be improved. We need to go to places with open minds; the willingness to immerse ourselves in another culture and not expect anything but what is ordinary for them.

This is just my opinion and I am sure others think our tourism industry is working better than ever. I am eager to see what others think.

Meghan

 

Crang, Philip. “Local-Global.” Geography, Modernity & Globalization II. 6th ed. Canada: Pearson, 2015. 24. Print.