文化觀光의 固有性과 脫近代觀光

Authenticity in Cultural Tourism and the Postmodern Tourism: A Discourse of Developing Cultural Heritage as Tourism Resource

The loss of authenticity of cultural properties has been actively discussed in recent years. This paper investigates cultural properties as tourism [toured] objects in the postmodern tourism. First, this study argues that the authenticity of cultural resources could be understood better by a continuum approach, from complete authenticity, through various stages of partial authenticity, to complete falseness than by a dichotomous approach between premodern 'authentic' and modern 'inauthentic.' It also suggests that cultural authenticity needs to be addressed through ontological authenticity because, in the postmodern era, culture undergoes a process of collapse due to the constant collision between the real world and imaginary world. This, in turn, proposes that commoditization of culture through tourism does not necessarily cause the loss of cultural authenticity. Rather it might provide opportunities for reconstruction of traditional culture and establishment of cultural identity.