Medialization of Touristic Reality: The Berlin Wall Revisited

Activity: Talk or presentationConference PresentationsResearch

Anja Saretzki - Speaker

We can assume that we meet reality not only when we see things, but when dissonant experiences occur. So we do not have to focus on the question of the essential being of the real. Instead, we have to concentrate on the problem, which relationships can be established with the experience of the world as conveyed in tourism.
Within the context of a case study on visitors of the Berlin Wall four kinds of relationships with reality can be demonstrated. The concept of reality as an immediate evidence is geared to the genuine act of seeing. It includes immediate cognition and recognition of ultimate realities in terms of an existential authenticity. If the knowledge of reality results from mediating authorities, then a guaranteed reality is given. That is, the tourist who visits this cultural heritage is provided with an objective authenticity in terms of absolute facts. This however contradicts the knowledge of authenticity as a social construct. The third kind of relationship with reality can be understood as the realisation of a coherent context. Relicts of the Berlin Wall are brought into a new context of meaning and create an individual authenticity. This kind of authenticity does not ask for assurance, but comes to a coherent update each time. But when this way of contextualisation proves to be dissonant, the context itself becomes a problem. Such a relationship with reality is based on the experience of resistance. Reality has lost its connection to individual experience. Reality interrupts the visitor as something unexpected. The consequent reaction is not reflection, but a reflex that is accompanied with the suspicion of all this being an illusion: Are the images, conveyed to the tourist, real or just a simulation?
For this reason, the promotion of cultural heritage faces a problem: The more the cultural heritage becomes decontextualised, the more it becomes an object of disneyfication; moreover, the visitor doubts the experienced reality. The postmodern game with authenticity and the discursiveness of contexts cause the abandonment of authenticity. Past becomes arbitrary and cultural heritage is not conveyed, but rather a promoted setting.
15.06.2007

Event

International Symposium on Aspects of Tourism - 2007: Gazing, Glancing, Glimpsing: Tourists and Tourism in a Visual World

15.06.07 → …

Eastbourne, United Kingdom

Event: Conference

Recently viewed

Publications

  1. Tourismusräume
  2. Towards a thick understanding of sustainability transitions - Linking transition management, capabilities and social practices
  3. Influence of the Microstructure and Silver Content on Degradation, Cytocompatibility, and Antibacterial Properties of Magnesium-Silver Alloys in Vitro
  4. Playing by Their Rules
  5. Globalization and the societal consensus of wealth tax cuts
  6. Is the reverse J-shaped diameter distribution universally applicable in European virgin beech forests?
  7. Do overlapping audit and compensation committee memberships contribute to better financial reporting quality?
  8. Can I believe what I see? Data visualization and trust in the humanities
  9. Machine Vision and Navigation
  10. Mythos
  11. It's Not What You Know, It's How You Use It
  12. Microstructural investigations of the Mg-Sn and Mg-Sn-Al alloy systems
  13. MIKAS - Mikroanalysen und amtliche Statistik
  14. Virtual Migration, Racism, and the Multiplication of Labour
  15. Context in natural-language communication
  16. Methodology for Integrating Biomimetic Beams in Abstracted Topology Optimization Results
  17. Participation as a Mode of Conflict
  18. Start-ups
  19. Motivation related to work
  20. A Combination of Energy Harvesting and Wireless Power Transfer for Applications in Harsh Environments
  21. Active Citizenship in the Planning Process
  22. Analphabetismus
  23. Origins and practices of genetic risk and responsibility
  24. Maria Luise Weissmann: "Ich wünsche zu sein, was mich entflammt".
  25. Sigrid Kopfermann
  26. Empathy and Donation Behavior Toward Happy and Sad Chimpanzees
  27. Vision als Aufgabe
  28. Towards an agri-environment index for biodiversity conservation payment schemes