Introduction
Any of normal undertakings are considered tourist venues when specific features are attached to it, for instance, they create particular values and meaning with a distinctive appeal to and attract tourists. Therefore, tourist venues are highly negotiated and socially constructed phenomenon. The tourist places encompass specifically two components of place. That is, the meanings created by such places created by the tourist industry, and secondly the meanings of such palaces consumed by those tourists visiting such areas (Saarinen, 2012).
There is significant overlap existing between the social constructions in the tourism industry in spite of the probable conflicting on-site evidence, which gives the suggestion that the actual experience of a place has no significant effect to the meanings of the place in question. The confirmation on this was made when a comparison between the various categories of tourists, revealing that the meaning of a place is primarily attributed to a place is highly inclined the pre-visiting variables, which entails, environmental experience and preferences and existing knowledge (Carter, 2013). Conceptually, a number of proposed tourist model back the point that a successful mature of a tourist place is dependent on the levels of consensus on the meanings which are negotiated between the systems of place consumption and place production. The identity of a place gives focus on the symbolic and emotional meanings recreationists attribute to such recreational venues, and place dependence depicts a correlation to the functional utility ascribed to the setting due to its ability to facilitate the desired experiences of leisure.
The Plurality of Place Concepts
The relationships between the physical landscape and the people have investigated from various frontiers to bring the meaning of the phenomenon. The concept of “place attachment” is used attributively to the aspects of connecting human-place bonding (Gergen, 2010). The concepts that have proved to be in connection to the tourist place phenomenon is the effect of such places on an individual’s feelings and emotions, which are accompanied with cognition, (for instance, belief, knowledge and thought) and practice (that is, behavior and action).
A different conceptualization indicated that the place attachment is considered to be a separate component of the wider and more encompassing aspect referred to as “sense of place.” Moreover, the tourists’ places are regarded to consist of cognitive, conative and affective components. Therefore, the place attachment describes the affective relationship existing between landscape and people –with the other components including place dependence (for instance, conative dimensions), place identity (for instance cognitive dimensions) which are conceptually in consistence with the leisure researcher definitions. A sense of a tourist place keeps into consideration of the geographical and social context of place bond alongside the sensing of places, for example, feeling of dwelling and aesthetics (Saraga, 2011). The local ancestry of a place and the insider status are regarded as very significant aspects in the development of a highly “rooted sense of place” –which refers to those individuals who are long-term residents of a community that included both the indigenous people and settlers.
The social construction of tourism value puts it to be a political tool which can be used in empowering the different ideologies and interests. The present nature of cultural tourism management encompassing the ranking of decisions, and values of what is supposed to be protected, with the processes usually political and contentious (Walker, Walker & Schmitz, 2013). A pluralistic perspective driven by principles of empowerment and equity recognizes that heritage has multiple meanings and that the meanings are not pre-given but are due to the interactions between an artifact and its temporal, social and spatial contexts.
Therefore, managing conflict is a critical aspect of managing cultural resources. Key organizations and governments look to the “experts” for example, architects and archeologists to objectively and rationally resolve the conflict that would arise from the competing values. Tourists’ sites managers should ensure that they make decisions which can both suppress and elevate different ideologies and interests. Therefore, this has prompted a continual questioning of whose cultural values and heritage are being conserved.
The Scales of Value
The tourism sector has gone through a philosophical transformation in line with recognizing the subjective nature of the concept and everything it entails. A fundamental aspect of the revised vision is the notion of value. In the context of tourism, value has proved to be the most desirable and important social, political, scientific and economic qualities of a place, an objector activity from the perspective of a group or an individual (Walker, Walker & Schmitz, 2013). The meanings, values or significance which are attached to the concept of tourism (objects and location) make the audience develop a sense of place and identity.
Socio-Cultural Influence on Meaning
In the view of social constructionism in tourism, the leisure researchers have shown slow acknowledgment of the influence associated with socio-cultural aspects on the various meanings tourists allude with tourist places. On the other hand, the focus has been given to the meanings individuals associate with specific leisure experiences. The patterns of leisure behavior are considered to be the product of social influences which are driven by social circles of friends, family, and workmates instead of individual factors. The social groups in leisure operate to socialize the members into leisure styles, formulate specific meanings of activity and ensure the development of norms of behavior in relation to the activity (Saraga, 2011). Through the social world perspective, the social worlds have been a representation of unique scheme of life that members tend to share in particular set of meanings in which the different cultural elements are formulated and a meaningful sense created by the social world members with an aim of setting a part the social world apart from the other social worlds.
Constructing Heritage Scales
The conceptualization of the various tourist sites revolves around various relative and comparative terms. That is, new versus old, contemporary versus traditional, heritage versus non-heritage, authentic and inauthentic –as applied by heritage professionals, local communities, and governments in defining the informal and formal spatial management practices within the tourism industry. Either, in the case of formal zoning of land uses, the educational activities tend to encourage or discourage specific aesthetics and behaviors (for instance, government running village workshops to produce handicrafts in several tourist places), or the village cultural appreciating specific locations as significant, individuals possess mental images of their world which would entail spatially differentiated levels of importance (Gergen, 2010). Hence, it is deduced that applying management strategies across place and space can be operated as a process of exclusion and inclusion, towards suiting a collective or individual, political, economic and social agendas (Saarinen, 2012).
With regard to the social construction of the scales of heritage, it is of great significance to consider the concept of cultural landscape due to its aspects of challenging existing western undertakings of tourism. The use of the cultural landscape terminology by the heritage experts could be regarded as a re-construct of heritage scales, particularly with the emphasis that landscape places gives consideration on the functional and associative values of interpretative space. In the context of cultural landscape, tourists’ sites and objects are indivisibly linked to their respective geographical context. Hence, the spaces of interpretation are absorbed into spaces of value. The cultural heritage landscapes are considered to possess three critical components which include visibility, cohesion, and boundaries.
Conclusion
The paper highlights on the findings that there is a need for the tourism sector to accord greater consideration to the social context in which leisure and recreational experiences are shared in the framework of their conceptualizations of tourist places construct (for instance, place attachment and sense of place). There is a little presentation on the leisure literature towards exploring how social networks impact on the meanings which the recreationists associate with a place together with the attachments to the social landscapes I which leisure experiences are enjoyed.
Nevertheless, acknowledgment of the humans’ attachment to the social landscapes and the social construction of the meaning of tourists’ places have long permeated other literatures. The paper has given an elaborate insight into the tourists’ social bonds to places (Carter, 2013). The examination gives a reflection on leisure researchers’ propensity to scrutinize human-place relationships in a framework of natural contexts with no concern on the consistency in which there is the existence of social attachments across other spatial contexts.
Moreover, there is an acknowledgment of the extent to which social worlds have an influence on the development of meanings of tourist place which is likely to vary in context. The meanings alluded to a place were pegged on social relations, memory, and experience. This renders physical attributes of a tourist venue to be of less significance, though; the physical environment would play a fundamental role in attributing the peoples’ attachment to such a setting.
References
Carter, S. (2013). Tourists' and travellers' social construction of Africa and Asia as risky locations. Tourism Management, 19(4), 349-358.
Gergen, K. J. (2010) Social Construction In Context, London: SAGE Publications Ltd.
Saarinen, J. (2012). The social construction of tourist destinations: the process of transformation of the Saariselkä tourism region in Finland.Destinations: cultural landscapes of tourism/Ed. Ringer, G.
Saraga, E. (2011) (Ed.) Embodying the Social: Constructions of Difference, London: Routledge.
Walker, D., Walker, T. & Schmitz, J. (2013). The Guide to Cross-Cultural Success: Doing Business Internationally. U.S.A.: McGraw-Hill.
