Spain Is (Still) Different: Tourism and Discourse in Spanish Identity

Spain Is (Still) Different addresses both theoretical perspectives on the study of tourism in Spain and specific cases of the cultural impact of travel and tourism on Spanish culture in the late eighteenth to early twenty-first centuries. With contributions from experts in leisure and culture studies, literature, film, and art historians from Spain, the UK, and the U.S., this innovative multi-disciplinary volume introduces readers to methodological and practical issues concerning the cultural function of tourism in Spain. The main body of contributions comes from the area of cultural studies. In the introduction, Afinoguénova and Martí-Olivella provide a comprehensive overview of the problematic of tourism in Spain and of diverse approaches to the study of tourism in its relation to Spanish culture. Unlike other collections on tourism studies, this book is aimed to bridge the gap between the social sciences and the humanities. It is structured to provide an example of how experts in different fields can use each other's work in order to achieve a multi-faceted understanding of the phenomenon of tourism and its implications.

Table of Contents:
Part 1 Introduction: A Nation under Tourists' Eyes: Tourism and Identity Discourses in Spain Part 2 Part I. Spanish Identity and Tourism Discourses Chapter 3 1. Emptying the Nation: Performing Spanishness in Cadalso's Moroccan Letters Chapter 4 2. On the Inception of Western Sex as Orientalist Theme Park: Tourism and Desire in Nineteenth-Century Spain (On Carmen and Don Juan as Femme Fatale and Latin Lover) Chapter 5 3. Marketing Convivencia: Contemporary Tourist Appropriations of Spain's Jewish Past Chapter 6 4. Reading Rural Tourism: On the Recreational Nature of Basque Heritage Part 7 Part II. Consuming History Chapter 8 5. Tourism and Consumption in Urban Spain, 1876-1975 Chapter 9 6. Modern Art Museums under Franco: Routines, Isolation, and Some Exceptions Chapter 10 7. A Snapshot of Barcelona from Montjuïc: Juan Goytisolo's Señas de identidad, Tourist Landscapes as Process, and the Photographic Mechanism of Thought Part 11 Part III. Spaces of (In)Difference Chapter 12 8. Toppling the Xenolith: The Reconquest of Spain from the "Tourist Invader" in Iberian Film since World War II Chapter 13 9. Miniskirts, Polka Dots, and Real Estate: What Lies under the Sun? Chapter 14 10. Touristic Trades and Neo-Colonial Subjects: Subplotting/Sexploiting Women

About the Author :
Eugenia Afinoguénova is assistant professor of Spanish at Marquette University. Jaume Martí-Olivella is associate professor of Hispanic cultural studies at the University of New Hampshire.

Review :
This is an innovative and enlightening volume that offers highly valuable insights on the crucial role played by the discourses and practices of tourism in the construction of modern Spanish identity. Its focus and approach is on the cutting edge area of Hispanic cultural studies. The essays included provide a careful examination of the contexts and political uses of tourism in the collective self-imagining of the nation. It will be an invaluable tool for scholars and students interested in the political and cultural ramifications of tourism in a global context. Spain is (Still) Different provides several essays on film that go beyond tourism to raise questions about Spanish reflections and identities as well. Spanish exceptionality is a centuries-old topic, but the ideology of Spanish difference as it pertains both to Spain's internal and external identity has never received a more thoroughgoing critical examination as in these intelligent and lucid essays. As a group they set new standards for debates concerning the discursive relationship between Spain's tourist industry, economic structures, and cultural production and identity in the modern era.