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This semester, I am taking another class that relates to the topic of travel. It’s geography of Tourism. Lately, we’ve studied the topics of greenwashing and responsible tourism. Greenwashing means that a company claims to be green more for the publicity that goes with the tag than because of their convictions of helping out the social and environmental well-being of the destination.

One of the principal things that we’ve learned is that common, mass tourism is inherently negative. Issues such as waste, consumption, cultural effects or environmental degradation all point out to the need to re-evaluate the way we travel. To some level, the conclusion is that people should be more ‘travelers’ and less ‘tourists’. Obviously, no one can deny that spending 2 weeks on white-sand beaches isin’t a relaxing experience. Then again, the consequences of our stay can bring much more bad than the relative economic contribution to the country.

All this to say that in travel litterature, most of the texts we’ve studied seem to have that same focus, that same idea. For example, in ‘white girl goes def in Guyana’, the narrator was on a trip to teach locals about sexual protection. Those text all have a focuss on contributing, on giving back to the host community. Obviously that the main goal is to share experiences through litterature. Then again, I feel the more ‘traveler’ we are the more authentic our experience of our trip will be.

Do you agree? What makes a traveler or a tourist more beneficial for the locals?

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