A sense of place: place, culture and tourism

The perspective of ‘place’ has emerged as important one in many realms of scholarship and professional practice. Ironically, though, tourism – in which place is a central concept – has paid little attention to the concept. This paper explores the importance of place in the context of tourism product development and marketing, particularly the linkage between place and culture as a tourism experience. The linkage can be understood through an analogy to the concept of terroir from viniculture. Terroir is the set of qualities that shape the sensory and intellectual appreciation of a wine, including soil, climate, grape variety and wine-making techniques. In the case of placed-based cultural tourism development and promotion, the terroir of a place includes history, local traditions and cultures, religion, industry, the natural environment, cuisine and arts, as well as attractions and events. A key feature of place-based product development and promotion is the identification and telling the story of a place through a variety of narrative techniques. These techniques include the tradition of oral storytelling, but also print, video, graphic and digital media. The paper examines the themes of stories often told in connection with place-based cultural tourism and illustrates these with examples drawn from a Canadian cultural destination.