Cultural Tourism Essay

Introduction

Tourism is defined as travelling for leisure, business, religious, family or recreational purposes for a limited time span.

Culture is defined as the society’s art, literature, and way of life, their value systems, traditions and beliefs. Culture can be seen through things like the language of the society, the way they react to certain situations and also through their way of thinking.

Cultural tourism happens when an individual travels in order to learn about culture of a country, through their lifestyle, history, art, architecture and many other elements involved in the society’s way of life.

Many cultural tourists would be likely to have visited the country for the first time and be from markets with very different geography

For example, a staged authenticity in Singapore could be the cultural performances held at Theatres on the Bay. It is staged because the theatre is a modern structure and the performances were not performed there in the past but rather during their own cultural traditions and celebrations but now they perform at the theatre for tourists to view which leads to it being not authentic.

Another issue that can shows staged authenticity in our culture is through the tours provided for tourists such as the Cultural and Historical Tour of Chinatown where tourists would be able to experience Chinatown’s history and culture during the night. It is inauthentic because of the fact that tourists would be touring Chinatown via an air-conditioned coach with a tour guide hence making it very comfortable and easy for the tourists instead of them experiencing the reality of the culture and interacting with the locals. There is a gap between them and the locals which does not allow them to learn the culture through firsthand experience but only through what the tour guide has to