In this Book
- A Landscape of Travel: The Work of Tourism in Rural Ethnic China
- Book
- 2014
- Published by: University of Washington Press
- Series: Studies on Ethnic Groups in China
-
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
summary
While the number of domestic leisure travelers has increased dramatically in reform-era China, the persistent gap between urban and rural living standards attests to ongoing social, economic, and political inequalities. The state has widely touted tourism for its potential to bring wealth and modernity to rural ethnic minority communities, but the policies underlying the development of tourism obscure some complicated realities. In tourism, after all, one person’s leisure is another person’s labor.
A Landscape of Travel investigates the contested meanings and unintended consequences of tourism for those people whose lives and livelihoods are most at stake in China’s rural ethnic tourism industry: the residents of village destinations. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in Ping’an (a Zhuang village in Guangxi) and Upper Jidao (a Miao village in Guizhou), Jenny Chio analyzes the myriad challenges and possibilities confronted by villagers who are called upon to do the work of tourism. She addresses the shifting significance of migration and rural mobility, the visual politics of tourist photography, and the effects of touristic desires for “exotic difference” on village social relations. In this way, Chio illuminates the contemporary regimes of labor and leisure and the changing imagination of what it means to be rural, ethnic, and modern in China today.
More about the author: http://www.jennychio.com/
While the number of domestic leisure travelers has increased dramatically in reform-era China, the persistent gap between urban and rural living standards attests to ongoing social, economic, and political inequalities. The state has widely touted tourism for its potential to bring wealth and modernity to rural ethnic minority communities, but the policies underlying the development of tourism obscure some complicated realities. In tourism, after all, one person’s leisure is another person’s labor.
A Landscape of Travel investigates the contested meanings and unintended consequences of tourism for those people whose lives and livelihoods are most at stake in China’s rural ethnic tourism industry: the residents of village destinations. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in Ping’an (a Zhuang village in Guangxi) and Upper Jidao (a Miao village in Guizhou), Jenny Chio analyzes the myriad challenges and possibilities confronted by villagers who are called upon to do the work of tourism. She addresses the shifting significance of migration and rural mobility, the visual politics of tourist photography, and the effects of touristic desires for “exotic difference” on village social relations. In this way, Chio illuminates the contemporary regimes of labor and leisure and the changing imagination of what it means to be rural, ethnic, and modern in China today.
Table of Contents
Download Full Book
- Title Page, Copyright Page
- pp. i-vi
- Acknowledgments
- pp. xxix-1
- Map of China
- p. 2
- Conclusion - Upper Jidao, Meet Ping’an
- pp. 209-232
- Glossary of Chinese Characters
- pp. 233-236
- References
- pp. 261-284
- Fm01
- p. i
- Fm02
- p. ii
- Title
- p. iii
- Copyright
- p. iv
- Dedication
- p. v
- Contents
- pp. vi-viii
- For
- pp. ix-xi
- Pre
- pp. xii-xxviii
- Ack
- pp. xxix-xxxi
- Halftitle
- pp. xxxii-1
- Map
- p. 2
- Int
- pp. 3-19
- Ch01
- pp. 20-71
- Ch02
- pp. 72-99
- Ch03
- pp. 100-131
- Ch04
- pp. 132-171
- Ch05
- pp. 172-207
- Conc
- pp. 208-232
- Glo
- pp. 233-235
- Notes
- pp. 236-260
- Ref
- pp. 261-283
- Index
- pp. 284-294
Additional Information
ISBN
9780295805061
Related ISBN(s)
9780295993652, 9780295993669
MARC Record
OCLC
875894432
Launched on MUSE
2014-04-24
Language
English
Open Access
Yes
Creative Commons
CC-BY-NC-ND