The anthropology of tourism has shown that tourist practices cannot be reduced solely to displacement or the consumption of destinations, but rather constitute complex scenarios of cultural production, identity negotiation and the global circulation of imaginaries (Appadurai, 1996; Bauman, 2004). From the pioneering work of Dean MacCannell (1976) and Valene Smith (1977) to Santana and Prats (2005) and Magali Paz et al. (2024), contemporary discussions on heritagization, cultural extractivism and the commodification of experience, tourism has become a strategic field for understanding the tensions between tradition and modernity. In Latin America, these debates acquire particular relevance due to the expansion of community-based, ethnic and spiritual tourism, as well as disputes over territory, authenticity and cultural economies. This panel seeks to bring together research that explores tourism as a total social phenomenon, attending to its symbolic, political, economic and cultural dimensions.
\nIn a context where tourism increasingly appears as a promise of development, economic growth and territorial transformation, it is important to ask about the forms of labor, inequality and conflict that emerge behind this industry. This panel opens a space for discussion on the relationships between tourism, labor precarization, extractivism, territorialities and the reconfiguration of local economies. We welcome papers exploring the precarization, flexibilization and emotionalization of employment in service- and experience-oriented tourism economies. Beyond celebratory narratives of tourism, we seek to think ethnographically about how this activity redefines capital-labor relations, transforms ways of life and reorganizes symbolic and material disputes in Latin America.
\nThe relationship between tourism and religion has gained special importance in the context of contemporary spiritual transformations and the growing global circulation of ritual practices, pilgrimages and wellness experiences. Religious spaces have simultaneously become sites of devotion, cultural heritage and tourist consumption, generating tensions between sacredness, market and spectacle. Pilgrimages, patron saint festivals, spiritual routes and alternative forms of religiosity show how the religious continues to reorganize mobilities, economies and forms of sociability. These dynamics are expressed both in the revitalization of indigenous and Afro-descendant traditions and in the expansion of therapeutic spiritualities and secularized spiritual tourism practices. This panel proposes to reflect on the multiple articulations between religion and tourism, attending to the disputes over meaning, authenticity and the economic use of the sacred.
\nWe welcome theoretical, ethnographic and comparative papers on the following lines.
\n*\tAnthropology of tourism and cultural heritagization.
\n*\tCommunity-based, ethnic and rural tourism.
\n*\tTourism labor, precarization and service economies.
\n*\tDigital platforms, mobility and new forms of tourism employment.
\n*\tSpiritual tourism, pilgrimages and religious mobilities.
\n*\tReligion, heritage and the commodification of the sacred.
\n*\tTerritorialities, extractivism and sociocultural conflicts arising from tourism.
\n*\tCultural tourism, memory and local identities.
\n*\tTourism in the context of disasters and other forms of dark tourism.
\n*\tTourism, affectivity and the production of subjectivities.
\n*\tCultural nomadism, contemporary spiritualities and wellness economies.
\n*\tTouristification and gentrification in intermediate cities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"template":"","simposio_area":[44],"class_list":["post-10302","simposio","type-simposio","status-publish","hentry","simposio_area-antropologia-y-antropologia-social"],"yoast_head":"\n