ANTH 180 Lecture Notes - Lecture 45: Cognitive Model, Commodification, Dark Tourism
6 Aug 2020
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Document Summary
Tourism to sights in the public sphere that are a result of destruction. Association of places with places of death and interest today. Ancient romans going to the colosseum could be seen as dark tourism. Understand the attraction of death and management issues raised by sensitive tourist sites. Commodification of death has become a pervasive feature within the contemporary visitor economy. In western secular society, ordinary death is hidden behind medical and professional facades. Extraordinary death is recreated for popular consumption. Dark tourism works as a social filter today between life and death. Dark tourism provides a physical place to link the living and the dead. Dark tourism offers a cognitive space for the self to construct a philosophical framework on the meanings of mortality. One of the appeals of dark tourism is the contradiction of what we think about our own culture and society-auschwitz. Bear witness and remember the dead while judging fundamentals of society.
