Aboriginal Cultural Tourism

Cape Breton Island, is located off the eastern most portion of mainland Canada at roughly 47°N, 60ºW (Brown, 2006). The indigenous peoples, the Mi’kmaq, have lived in the region for approximately 11,000 years and have had contact with Europeans for 400 hundred years. They call Cape Breton Island, Unama’ki, Land of the Fog (Milburn, 2004). Aboriginal cultural tourism and the importance of product authenticity is discussed. The paper provides a case narrative of Aboriginal cultural tourism involving five First Nations communities on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, Canada. The island contains five reserves of the Mi’kmaq Nation, these being: Eskasoni, Membertou, Wagmatcook, We’kopaq/Waycobah, and Potlotek/ Chapel Island. The combined population of these five communities is 7149, approximately 7% of the island’s population(INAC, 2007).