Home Institution

University of Oregon

Publication Date

Spring 2014

Program Name

Morocco: Multiculturalism and Human Rights

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to shed light on why Western tourists come to Morocco and to analyze how cultural tourism developed here as an institution. In doing so, the research hopes to explore the implications of cultural tourism in Morocco with respect to modernization and imagined geographies inherited from a colonial past. Through analysis of official tourism strategies, trip packages, online reviews, interviews, and personal experiences the research will examine tourists through a sociological lens and attempt to characterize the relationship between tourist and attraction. It will find that the tourists observed tend to place a great deal of importance on having an “authentic” experience and will explain the process through which select sights in Morocco have been transformed into something significant to Western tourists. Through these findings it will be possible to infer that Western tourists’ expectations of Morocco influence the way in which Moroccan culture is displayed to them and to explore how this constructed reality perpetuates colonial legacies.

Disciplines

Leisure Studies | Near and Middle Eastern Studies | Tourism

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