Top-down and bottom-up approaches to heritage on two Texas trails

Tourist trails, and heritage trails specifically, are an increasingly common feature within the tourism landscape. Stakeholders develop and promote trails for a variety of political, cultural, and economic reasons. Top-down approaches involve authoritative identification of sites that are often grand in nature and support official narratives. In bottom-up approaches, communities are involved in development of their own heritage that may be modest or ordinary and reflect local stories. This study examines two examples of trails organized around the theme of Hispanic heritage in the U.S. state of Texas. In the U.S., Hispanics are the largest ethnic minority with nineteen percent of the population; in the state of Texas, this demographic accounts for thirty-eight percent. The first example illustrates a top-down approach on a state-wide driving trail; the second example features a local walking trail in an Austin neighborhood. Using each trail’s written guides, the research examines site selection and heritage narration. The former guide promotes the grand heritage of the presidios and mission churches and the nation-building narratives of conquest and heroic European-descended male figures. The latter guide showcases the neighborhood’s diverse community members and the ways in which the local is situated within larger state and/or national narratives.