Читать книгу Sociology - Anthony Giddens - Страница 193

Have you ever had a face-to-face conversation with someone from another country or connected to an overseas website? Have you ever travelled to another continent on business or for a holiday? If you answered ‘yes’, then you have experienced one of the consequences of globalization. Globalization has changed both the frequency and the character of interactions between people of different nations. The historical sociologist Charles Tilly defines globalization in terms of these changes. According to Tilly (1995: 1–2), ‘globalization means an increase in the geographic range of locally consequential social interactions.’ In other words, a greater proportion of our interactions come to involve, directly or indirectly, people from other countries.

Globalization has greatly expanded the possibilities for international travel, both by encouraging an interest in other countries and by facilitating the movement of tourists across borders. High levels of international tourism translate into an increase in the number of face-to-face interactions between people of different countries. John Urry (2002; Urry and Larsen 2011) argues that the ‘tourist gaze’ – the expectations on the part of tourists of what they will experience while travelling abroad – shapes many of these interactions.

Urry compares the tourist gaze to Foucault’s conception of the medical gaze (see chapter 10, ‘Health, Illness and Disability’). He argues that the tourist gaze is just as socially organized by professional experts, just as systematic in its application and just as detached as the medical gaze, but this time in its search for ‘exotic’ experiences. These are experiences that violate everyday expectations about how social interaction and interaction with the physical environment are supposed to proceed.

Yet, apart from those seeking out extreme experiences, most tourists do not want their experiences to be too exotic. A popular destination for young travellers in Paris, for example, is a McDonald’s restaurant. Some go to see if there is any truth to the line from Quentin Tarantino’s movie Pulp Fiction that, because the French use the metric system, McDonald’s ‘quarter pounder with cheese’ hamburgers are called ‘Royales with cheese’ (it is true). Britons travelling abroad often cannot resist eating and drinking in comfortable British- and Irish-style pubs. It is these contradictory demands for the exotic and the familiar that are at the heart of the tourist gaze.

The tourist gaze may put strains on face-to-face interactions between tourists and locals. Locals who are part of the tourist industry may appreciate the economic benefits, but others may resent tourists for their demanding attitudes and the overdevelopment that occurs in popular destinations. As with most aspects of globalization, the overall impact of these intercultural encounters has both positive and negative consequences.