Bali: Cultural Tourism and Touristic Culture

Celebrated for the richness of its artistic and religious traditions, the island of Bali has made its culture the brand image of its tourist product. This has aroused fears among foreign observers and indigenous authorities alike, who wonder in unison whether Balinese culture will survive the impact of tourism. But beyond the legitimate disquiet that it signals, this question is misleading, for it implies that tourism is an external force striking a receptive milieu, whereas the issue really is to understand how the touristification of a society works from within, affecting the view that a society has of itself. To this end, the author puts into perspective the way the Balinese present their culture to tourists, and the way they represent it to themselves when they speak of tourism. He shows how the imperatives of the tourist promotion of their culture have conditioned their motives for preserving it to the extent that the Balinese end up taking the brand image of their tourist product as a marker of their cultural identity. Incited to preserve and promote their culture in regard to the tourist gaze, the Balinese today have come to the point where they look to tourists for confirmation of their Balinese-ness.