Author: Wang, Caleb
Date: 2001
Supervisor: Prof Keyan Tomaselli ABSTRACT

This work is an evaluation of the approach of pro-poor tourism (Ashley, C., Goodwin, H., Roe, D. 2001. Pro-poor Tourism Strategies: Making tourism work for the poor. Overseas Development Institute). Using selected case studies from Zulu and Bushmen communities, the author examines the viability of the approach as a way of using cultural tourism to secure sustainable development in these communities. Initially, the dissertation considers three paradigms of development to locate the pro-poor tourism approach, as well as explain the necessary role of participation in strategies for sustainable development. Next, the author explains the workings of the cultural tourism industry, to determine whether it serves to commodify culture, and whether it can bring non-economic benefits to participating communities. The final section examines the ability of the pro-poor tourism approach to integrate the previous two. That is, an evaluation of the approach's success as a practical application to use cultural tourism as sustainable development. The case studies are considered in terms of the partnerships promoted by the approach as the way to build the capacity of communities to support their commercial success. The practical evaluation of the approach in this way illustrates the value and usefulness of pro-poor tourism but also provides cautions and exposes flaws in the approach. Having concluded that the pro-poor tourism approach is a viable means of bringing sustainable development to communities, the author promotes the adoption of pro-poor strategies to 'tilt the benefits of tourism towards the poor communities involved'.

Author: von Stauss, Alexandra
Date: December 2000
Published: No
Type of Product: Unplublished research essay. Critical comment welcome. Part of a broader research project on cultural tourism and visual anthropology being conducted by the Graduate Programme in Cultural and Media Studies under the leadership of Professor Keyan Tomaselli.
Copyright: A von Stauss
This is not an essay in the conventional sense. It does not come up with a question to be answered or an assumption to be argued. Rather, it is reminiscent of a narrative or a story, which serves to clarify my position on the phenomenon of cultural tourism. Therefore, the main concern of this essay is to theorize some of my personal experiences during two field trips to South African, so-called cultural sites: the Rob Roy cultural village (KwaZulu Natal) and the !Khomani Bushmen community (Northern Cape), the Kruiper family, in the Kalahari Desert. Basic premise of this paper is the recognition that an analysis of others results from interactional encounters and processes in which we are personally involved (Coffey, 1999: 115). In order to make sense of and give frameworks to some of my experiences, interactions and positions in the field, I will reflect on the interaction between observer, the ‘Same’, and observed, the ‘Other’, in the light of cultural tourism and the phenomenon of cultural tourism itself. An investigation of the representation of Bushmen and Zulu identity at the two sites concerned will be given. This essay has to be understood as a highly subjective, reflexive approach to the topic of cultural tourism. Given my agency in the field trip as an active participant, the subjective selection of the material and its reconstruction involve a biographical dimension and narrative, in the pursuit of identifying some of the contradictions and problems I see with cultural tourism. Thus, seen in reflexive light, this essay is an account for personal communications, face-to-face interactions and encounters.

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Author: Simoes, Anthea
Date: 1999
Graduate Programme in Cultural and Media Studies, University of Natal, Durban
In his theoretical paper entitled, “Identity and Cultural Studies: Is That All There Is?” Laurence Grossberg refers to Stuart Hall’s distinction between two different “historical and strategic” models of identity (1996: 89). The first emphasizes the existence of single and separate identities and the second emphasizes the existence of a multiplicity of identities, where identity is interpreted as incomplete and relational. In examining the Bushmen¹ of Southern Africa, it becomes clear that their identity is contested and is unstable. Grossberg’ s second model is therefore applicable. The specific issues of the construction of identity through discursive practices of representation, the dependency of identity formation on temporal and spatial concerns, on language and on narratives of the body, as well as the modern South African context of identity and intercultural exchange, will be discussed in relation to the Bushman identity. The focus of this analysis is largely based on the manifestation of Bushman identity in the realm of cultural tourism. The empirical evidence that is evaluated in the discussion relates to a Kalahari Bushmen family, the Kruipers, who are living on the Kagga Kamma Private Game Reserve in the Western Cape, South Africa. (The research team who went to the reserve was headed by Professor Keyan Tomaselli of the Graduate Programme of Cultural and Media Studies, Merrideth, his niece from Australia, Jeffrey Sehume, a PhD student at the Centre and myself).

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Author: Kilonda, Abeli
Date: 2001
Place: University of Natal, Durban, Graduate Program in Cultural and Media Studies
Type of product: research report, assessing the nature of the encounter relating to a cultural tourism and agricultural survey in the Northern Province, South Africa. Sponsored via the P.E.A.C.E Foundation, University of Natal, and the University of Pretoria.
Copyright: Abeli Kilonda Abstract

“Since I was born, it’s the first time I see white people in my village (…) we are very honored.” These words innocently said by a 35-year-old man and addressed to some of the University of Pretoria Anthropology students, can strongly express the genuine feeling of people in Mabetha village. Although all of us, student researchers came from outside Mabetha and could not speak Northern Sotho or Pedi, apart form Thobela or Dumela, (which stand for Hello), only four (white) students (from China, Netherlands and South African), actually grabbed the attention of the villagers. They were considered as real foreigners. Villagers were really impressed and said they felt honored to be visited by white people. They could talk to them around the fire, eat the same food with them, drink ntakunyisa in the same pot, smoke and share the same piece of “dagga”. They could see these white people getting drunk (…) and ‘behaving like blacks’. In fact, black people were in a process of demystification of Whites while the latter where trying to identify themselves to the former.

Using an interpretive methodology and the Phaneroscopic Table (Tomaselli 1999:37), this study aims to reveal and enlighten some of the myths and stereotypes that more often inform and shape White-Black relationship with respect to power relations. The encounter between people of Mabetha and these white students happened and has to be regarded in a particular con-text (Tomaselli 1999, p. 34) of hegemonic power relations whereas whites have been presented (and see themselves) as superior and Blacks see themselves as second zone human beings.

Acknowledgements

This study is the outcome of my trip and experience in Mabetha village in the Northern Province of South Africa. It was organised and sponsored by the P,E,A,C,E, Foundation to which I am grateful for the wonderful and useful experience I made there.

I am greatly indebted to my colleagues Linje Manyozo and Xolani Nxumalo with whom I spent a wonderful time in the Northern Province. I am especially indebted to Linje who willingly accepted to go through my first draft for corrections and comments.

Introduction

In his “The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life” (1956), Ervin Goffman is mainly dealing with the issue of social performance when individuals enter in presence of one another. His main assumption is that when individuals are in one another’s immediate physical presence, they interact, that is, they inevitably impact on one another’s behavior. Consequently, they cannot leave the encounter without having expressed themselves or being impressed by others. Expression of oneself and impression of others, two sides of the same reality in which the former naturally induces to the latter, seem to be unavoidable in the process of any encounter; “…the individual, Goffman argues, will have to act so that he intentionally or unintentionally expresses himself, and the others will in turn have to be impressed in some way by him.” (1956: 2)

This ‘natural’ need and ‘spontaneous’ tendency of individuals to express themselves and impress others can be seen as the result of the assumption of previous experiences which each of the participants to the encounter have gone through: experience of oneself in relation or in opposition to the others; experience of the ‘Sameness’ (of whites) in opposition to the ‘Otherness’ (of blacks). It is worth noticing, at this stage, that this previous experience creates a con-text or a situation (Goffman, 1956) “ out of which all kinds of texts arise” (Tomaselli, 1999: 34). That is what Goffman (1956: 1) assumed when he stated:

Information about the individual helps to define the situation, enabling others to know in advance what he will expect of them and what they may expect of him. Informed in these ways, the others will know how best to act in order to call fort a desired response from him.

Participants to the encounter need information about each other and rely on different experiences of previous similar encounters in order to ‘know how best to act (…)’; that is, they need this knowledge for a better performance. This is another key word in Goffman’s theory, which will be crucial for this study. He defines it as “all the activity of a given participant on a given occasion which serves to influence in any way any of the other participants”. (Goffman, 1956: 8)

From this definition of performance, it can be argued that given the fact that participants to an encounter come from divergent cultural backgrounds, their ‘activity’, or performance will differ from one another. The background and history of participants impact greatly on the nature of the performance. In addition to this, there is another fact that can also determine the nature of the performance: the context or what Goffman (1956: 8) calls the ‘occasion’ of the encounter. People react differently on different occasions, which demand different masks or personas. It is worth enlightening the crucial role of these two factors in impacting on the nature of the performance: the history (time dimension) of the participants to the encounter and the occasion (space dimension) of the encounter.

The encounter I am reporting on in this particular study involves people of Mabetha village in the Northern Province of South Africa on one hand, and on the other, a group of student researchers (blacks and whites). All of them came from outside of Mabetha and could not speak local languages (Sesotho or Sepedi). Numerous events occurred during this particular encounter as a result of many different factors, like origin, language, race and history. Mabetha is a rural area with no electricity, whilst these students came from urban milieus (Pretoria and Durban). Mabetha villagers were almost struggling to communicate with their guests in English (the language of ‘Whites’ and academics) and these students could not speak any of the local languages. Four of these students were white. Like all black South Africans who have some experience of Apartheid “which held black people in an oppressive political and economic bondage” (Tomaselli, 1999:39), Mabetha villagers know better than anyone else what means to be discriminated on racial grounds. In fact, many consequences of what happened in South Africa prior to 1994 are still prevailing in Mabetha village.

It is vital that this self-reflexive study demonstrates how these factors are likely to produce a particular kind of conduct and response when these two groups of people enter the presence of one another. “Takunyisa” and the black face of Whitein Mabetha village (which could also be “Ntakunyisa” and the white face of Black) is a description of how whites can attempt to ‘behave like blacks’ and conversely blacks to be close to whites and speak their language. Gofman’s theory of social performance will provide a solid theoretical framework within and through which I will read my experience in Mabetha village. It has been argued that the particular conduct issued from this encounter was the result of various factors; to infer to this assumption, an interpretative methodology will be of great significance and utility. The phaneroscopic table (Tomaselli, 1999:37; 1990:175) therefore will be used to trace the three levels of meaning one can find in various aspects of this encounter.

I. The encounter

My trip to Mabetha village in the Northern Province was arranged and sponsored by PEACE Foundation. Based on a Local Economic Development project, PEACE Foundation, an NGO located at the University of Natal in Durban, works on community development and poverty alleviation projects in rural and remote communities. It has been appointed as the implementing agent to carry out a poverty alleviation project, known as the Bakenberg Tourism Project in Mabetha. Mabetha village (previously known as Basterpad) is situated in Bakenberg district in the Northern Province of South Africa. It is around 40 km away from Potgietersrus.

Before the implementation of the project, the first step was to carry out surveys of both the natural resources and human skills in Mabetha Village. Professor Chris Boonzaaier from the Department of Anthropology, University of Pretoria agreed to conduct the research project which would assess some of the economic potential at Mabetha village with regard to the local production of agricultural products, craft products as well as the historical and cultural aspect of the area with regard to economic potential for the tourist industry. He identified six of his students to participate to the project. At the request of the Graduate Program in Cultural and Media Studies, University of Natal (Durban), my colleagues Linje Manyozo, Xolani Nxumalo and I volunteered to spend some time during our winter vacation by going to Mabetha and participate to the research.

We arrived in Mabetha at around four in the afternoon that Monday 25 ^th June 2001. While waiting in Potgietersrus for our host Lesibe Masebe to come and pick us to Mabetha, we decide to go and have some lunch in the closest restaurant we saw: Wimpy. Then a strange thing happens. People in the restaurant were looking at us in a manner which seemed to say: “what are you doing here, have you lost your way?” I immediately thought that what attracted the curiosity of people were our huge travelling bags. My companion Xolani, who is a South African and more aware of the situation, told me later that we were the only black clients in the restaurant. That’s also the reason why, as I realized later, Lesibe Masebe, our host came straight toward us and ask us if we were the students from Natal University he has been looking for. It was not difficult for him to find us in that ‘only whites ’ place.

We then took a taxi on a partly tar, partly gravel road towards Mabetha village. In the taxi, people were conversing in local languages: Sesotho or Sepedi. As we could not participate in the conversation with people, since we did not know any of these languages and given our quite exclusive use of English, people become aware of our status as foreigners and more curious of us. Some young men dauntlessly dare to ask where we were from, where we were going and for which purpose, (…). They were certainly amazed to hear another way of speaking English: my English was strongly French accented. Maybe that was the reason why one of the young men I was talking to told me that I was a “creative thinker”. I could not understand -even now- what he really meant by this expression which made us laugh all the way to Mabetha and the rest of our stay there. We had a friendly chat with these young men who willingly offer themselves to help us as guide and interpreter for our future research.

When we arrived in Mabetha, people who had been already informed on our arrival were very curious: we soon became subject of their conversations. Then I noticed another event. We came across a group of young people who were playing in the street. When they saw us, they stopped playing and some of them ventured to greet us, in what seemed to be English, ‘good morning’ (it was almost 6.00 in the afternoon). This made the others laugh. They corrected these English practitioners and said they should say ‘Good afternoon’.

In the evening, together with the Pretoria students, we used to gather around the fire after diner and share on our experiences and findings; we spent long hours discussing questions about the research. We would also talk about life in the different cities, Durban and Pretoria. We would talk about the different universities, Natal and Pretoria. Often we would talk of films we had watched and particularly dominating the scenes would be Hannibal and Silence of he Lambs. It is worth noticing that all this happened when Professor Boonzaaier was there. Students would then report back to the Professor on what had been done during the day. On these occasions, nobody from the village, apart from guides and interpreters, could come and take part to these formal and academic discussions. But, when the professor was not around, it was another story. Those evening discussions were no longer planned and were simply replaced by a kind of informal socialisation between students and people of Mabetha who, since students arrived in the village, used to gather around them. Young ladies would come around supposedly to assist the one who was helping in the kitchen. It was on these occasions that our fellow white students used to express themselves freely. Since they had their own car, they would go to Potgietersrus, which was 40 kms away and buy beer. In the village they would order some Ntakunyisa and dagga for the evening ‘socialisation’. At one time, this drinking spree continued up to 5:00 in the morning and there were neither work nor breakfast that morning. We (University of Natal students) could not take our breakfast because the food was locked in with the sleeping students. At another time, due to overdose of Ntakunyisa and dagga, Eliza, one of the white students, fell sick the next morning and had to be rushed to Pretoria hospital. That was the end of her fieldwork and Professor Bonzaaier was only told that she had fallen sick and had gone to hospital for a check-up. This event was likely to increase the curiosity of villagers and call from them another responsive conduct.

There were many other events which could bring up more reflection and from which I could draw various interpretations. However, I would like to focus my reflection only on these few events that I have mentioned above. Coming from the Democratic Republic of Congo, a French speaking country, bearing my own culture and history, I was caught up in a process of re-discovering myself in discovering the others. My eyes were going from one side to another, from Mabetha villagers to my fellow colleagues. What I saw and the way I saw it was informed by my own experience.

II. The significance of the (previous) experience in the performance

II.1. Previous experience.

An encounter, especially when people from various origins, culture, background and class are involved, can be presented as a stage, a “front stage” (Goffman, 1956) where they are acting and revealing themselves in front of the others. It is a new occasion (time and space) in which participants are performing in accordance to previous experiences on each other. This becomes even more patent when the issue of race differences, with the whole set of myths and ideologies behind it, is concerned in the encounter; when different race groups are involved, as is the case in this study.

In fact, talking about race, power and the representation of ‘black-white’ relationships in South African film making under the late apartheid regime, Tomaselli (1986) argues that the issue of race differences and its consequences are more often the result of myths created and sustained by the (white) ruling class in the interest of political expediency. He points out that “…the ruling class, the hegemonic bloc, propagates myths about other classes and groups precisely because they have political control: they are the myth-makers. They create and modify various myths to suit the political exigencies of the moment” (p. 4).

Mabetha village and its people in the Northern Province, like other disadvantaged and disempowered people in South Africa, continue to experience a situation where they are even unaware of the ‘unnaturalness’ of the reality and conditions under which they are living. The myths created by the (white) ruling class have achieved to transform historical facts into natural ones. “Myth transforms history into nature: dominant historical processes are made to appear ‘natural’ and ‘inevitable’, even God-given” (Tomaselli 1986, p. 3). Consequently, they behave and organize their perception of life accordingly to suit this new “Common-sense” (Barthes, 1973: 166), Right Reason, the Norm, General Opinion…

Although it can be assumed that myths do change and cultural practices along with, it is worth mentioning that this move will take long time to occur unless some forces (intellectual, economics and politics) intervene to speed up the process. Meanwhile, in Mabetha village, like in many rural and remote areas, myths and common stereotypes about white supremacy and black inferiority are still running. In fact, for a long time, whites people have been presented, in films and other means, as superior, more intelligent, or ‘first-class’ human being. People in Mabetha were accustomed to white farmerswho could employ them as farm-workers and provide them with a better future life. They are living under poor conditions with no electricity and sufficient health services such as running water and proper sanitation, while few kilometers away from their ‘dark’ village, stands their white neighbor’s house with electricity and all basic facilities.

The current encounter could hardly fail to incorporate, in the part of Mabetha people, all the previous experiences black South African people in general and themselves in particular, have gone through in their relation to white people. In the same way, these white students, although they did not put it in words, could not prevent themselves from incorporating in their mind the idea of black people as ‘the noble savage civilized’ (Tomaselli, 1986), ‘the colonized’ and, at the end of the process, the ‘Other’ to the historical ‘Same’.

In fact, examining the relationship between media constructions of First and indigenous peoples, and the “performative primitives” who are employed in “cultural” villages in KwaZulu-Natal (South Africa), Tomaselli (1999:176) argues that:

The concrete encounter of a subject in a phaneron means that what is experienced will incorporate the accumulated consequences of previous differences of experience. The relevant differences are ontological: the history constructed by one section of society will refer to a world not quite the same as that constructed by someone from another part.

II.2. The performance

Thinking on several motivations which can lead an individual to perform in a particular way when he/she appears before others, and his/her state of self-consciousness or unconsciousness, Goffman (1956: 3) establishes three main motivations. Firstly, the individual may be aware of his/her impressions to others and the kind of response he/she wants to obtain from them. He/she will act in a thoroughly calculating manner. Secondly, the individual can be consciously and intentionally directed, in his/her performance, by the tradition of his/her group or social status which requires a particular kind of behaviour. And thirdly, the individual may be lead by his/her tradition when performing and yet be unconscious of it.

The first two motivations described above can easily be traced in the encounter I am reporting on, with regard to the white students behavior. They were adopting two different attitudes depending on the presence or absence of Professor Bonzaaier. The professor was representing the ‘tradition’ and orthodoxy of ‘whiteness’. His presence among the (white) students was a constant reminder which aimed to keep them aware of their whiteness and ‘Sameness’ in front of blacks. It can thus be argued that they were intentionally performing in accordance to the tradition of their social group. However, when the Professor was not around, they were acting in a quite ‘calculating manner’ “in order to give the kind of impression to others that is likely to evoke from them a specific response” (Goffman, 1956:3)

In fact, when all these things were happening, the thought that often come to mind was that these white students were trying to be black, particularly that they were over enthusiastic about village life. However, sitting down and re-looking at them again, there emerged some missing pieces on the puzzle. All these boozing took place in the absence of the Professor. And Gaby, another white student, even indicated that he would not want the Professor to know that he smoked. He was in fact confessing that he put on a ‘good boy’ show in front of the Professor. What this entailed however was that these students were pretending to be ‘whites’. Bonzaaier’s presence called on them to be whites, which they were not in his absence. This also taught us to remember that being white or black has nothing to do with color, but rather behaviour. The drinking and smoking was a longing for what they really were. The reality, which may seem confusing, is that these students though have 'white skins’, are actually black.

It should be noted that in this particular encounter, the ‘performers’ (both villagers and white students) were not looking to reveal or to re-construct a kind of (lost) ‘authenticity’ as it usually appears in cultural tourism. In fact, in cultural tourism, indigenous people use to perform front stage what they believe “having been”, and then when they retire, back stage, they are carrying on “their own social, leisure, and symbolic lives” (Goffman, 1956). They are performing only in order to meet tourist’s expectations. The fire place as well as streets in Mabetha village were offering a totally different kind of encounter whereas performers were looking to ‘resemble’, to identify themselves with the ‘Other’. Of course, the starting point was the assumption (on both sides) of the ‘Sameness’ of whites (Europeans) in ‘contradistinction’ (Tomaselli, 1999) to the ‘Otherness’ of blacks (Africans).

In order to reach this kind of mutual-identification, the fireplace encounter ought to be ‘a working consensus’, a kind of ‘interactional modus vivendi’ (Goffman, 1956) between the two people, where they agree to act in that particular way for that particular moment. It must be understood that the fireplace facilitates this temporally agreement; it is a circumstance under which this consensus is made. In a different circumstance, two people would never reach the same consensus. If one of the Mabetha villagers, for example, had to meet one of these white students away from Mabetha, I am not quite sure he/she could say: “I am honored to have met you”. The agreement is created or at least facilitated by the circumstance under which it is made. That is the reason why it is essentially ephemeral: it relies on the present situation; if the circumstances of the encounter change, the consensus will follow. Writing on the role of interaction setting in determining the nature of the encounter, Goffman (1956:4) argues: “ It is to be understood that the working consensus established in an interaction setting will be quite different in content from the working consensus established in different type of setting.”

The previous experience and information (stereotypes, preconceived ideas…) that the participants to the encounter have about each other is crucially important. It is on the basis of this initial information that they can define the situation and build up lines of responsive action. In the streets of Mabetha, the young people who greeted us knew that we could not speak their language, we were foreigners and could only speak the language of whites. Therefore, their response also, informed by their inner desire to raise themselves up, was to speak the language of whites. These white students, in getting drunk and “behaving like blacks” knew quite well that these villagers, as a (previously) disadvantaged and disempowered people, could be impressed to be so close to them and to share the same food, drink and smoking ‘dagga’ with them.

III. Semiotic analysis

Using the phaneroscopic table, I intend now to apply it to the reading and interpretation of this particular encounter. One could question the relevance of this methodology applied to this current study. I have been dealing with the issue of previous experiences informing a particular kind of conduct. It means that there is a whole set of underground elements that need to be revealed for a better understanding of one another’s conduct. The Phanerom, which is defined as “the collective total of all that is in any or any sense present to the mind, regardless of whether it corresponds to any real thing or not” [Peirce in Hartshorne and Weis1.284] (Tomaselli, 1990:174), can actually help to dig this underground for a better understanding of performances.

Nature of Semiotic Interaction

I am going to apply the Phaneroscopic Table vis-à-vis Firstnes, Secondness and Thirdness of the encounter which involves white students who try to ‘behave like blacks’ and black who aspire to get close to whites.

The firstness of this event, the encounter of this encounter can be traced in the strangeness of one in front of other; the conscience of differences between self (not the same) and others. Each of the participants, put in front of other, faces and realises the strangeness of the others. That is the first step that corresponds to the “being-there” of the phenomenological discourse.

The secondness of this encounter, the experience, can actually be traced in the effective assumption of the difference. It is worth mentioning that in the first step, it was a mere conscience of difference between the two participants. In this stage, participants to the encounter are aware of their differences and their previous experiences; but they perform in a way which responds better to the situation. I would like to illustrate this with what I saw and experienced in Mabetha village. These white students were fully aware of previous experiences between blacks and whites and stereotypes that use to characterize them. In socializing with local people, by being very close to them and behaving like them, they knew they would impact on their response. And that is what happened: every evening, villagers were gathering around the fire just to be close to them, to see them eating, drinking local beer (Ntakunyisa) and smoking “dagga”.

The thirdness, intelligibility, of this encounter can be presented as the result of the encounter. It answers the question how these people (white students and Mabetha villagers) made sense of this particular encounter. This encounter can be seen as a process of identification with the Other: white students behaving like blacks and blacks attempting to get close to the image (representation) of the “white master”. I can now understand better what this 35-year-old man meant when he said: “Since I was born, it’s the first time I see white people in my village (…) we are very honored.” In fact, he used to see white people, who were farmers or politicians and who used to live far from him (physically and psychologically). This was the first time he could see white people with a friendly face, whom he could identify with: a black face on white.

Conclusion

“Ntakunyisa” and the black face of white in Mabetha village was an attempt to read my experience in Mabetha village. This self-reflexive study managed to establish some stereotypes which characterize white and black relationships. With focus on the encounter between student researchers (whites and blacks) on one hand, and on the other, villagers in Mabetha. Drawing on Goffman’s (1956) theory of social performance, I argued that participants in this particular encounter interacted: they consciously or unconsciously impacted on one another’s behavior according to their own experience on one another. This brought me to use semiotics in order to analyse this underground set of experiences which influence performers of a particular encounter.

In the present study, I came up to find that in this particular encounter around the fireplace and in the streets of Mabetha, and unlike what can happen in cultural tourism, participants were likely to give up their differences and ‘authenticity’ and to identify to one another.

Bibliography

Barthes, R. 1973. Mythologies. (Lavers, A. Trans.). London: Paladin.

Goffman, E. 1956. ThePresentation of Self in Everyday Life. University of Edinburgh: Social Science research Center.

Tomaselli, K. et al. 1986. Myth, Race and Power. South Africans Imaged on Film and TV. Bellville: Anthropos.

Tomaselli, K. 1999. Appropriating Images. The Semiotics of Representation. Denmark: Intervention Press.

Tomaselli, K. “The Semiotics of Anthropological Authenticity: The Film Apparatus and Cultural Accommodation”. Visual Anthropology. 14 (1999): 173-183.

Author: Jeursen, Belinda
Date:
Place: Graduate Programme in Cultural and Media, Studies University of Natal, Durban My objectives in going to Eastern Bushmanland in 1996 were specific as well as open-ended[1]. Specifically, I wanted to focus my research on issues of representation with which I am concerned in my Ph.D work, but I also wanted to be open to other issues which arose during the experience. I planned to interview people about the representation of their culture and themselves in films, advertisements, the popular press and museums, to meet people I had read about or seen on film, to talk with development workers and members of the organisations working with the Ju/' hoansi, and to compare what I found in Bushmanland with what I had seen on a similar trip to the Kalahari in Western Botswana in April 1995. I wanted to speak to people about the realities of living in a place like Eastern Bushmanland as compared to what is represented in various media about them. I was also aware that tourism and a long history of research in the area would play some part in my interviews.

In July 1996 Prof. Tomaselli, Gareth Morgan and myself drove from Durban to Windhoek, where we met up with Sonja Speeter and Kaitira Kandjii and bought supplies. We then drove on to Grootfontein and then to Tjum!kui in Eastern Bushmanland. It took five days of solid driving to get there. Tjum!kui is a very small village with a school, a clinic, twostores, a church, government offices, a police station and a tourist lodge. About half an hour's drive further east is Baraka, a settlement where members of the Nyae Nyae Development Foundation and the Nyae Nyae Farmers' Co-Operative live and work with their families. They have wooden huts for housing, offices, guest accommodation and facilities such as a kitchen. We chose to camp and as it turned out we did so in temperatures of minus seven degrees celsius, listening to elephants coming through the camp at night in search of water and the local dogs barking at hyenas.

Eastern Bushmanland has not always existed in its present form. Until the 1950's about 1 250 Ju/'hoansi hunted and gathered over an area of 45 000 square kilometres. When the area was divided into ethnic homelands in the 1960s according to recommendations by the Odendaal Commission, the Ju/'hoansi found themselves confined to an area of 17 750 square kilometres, not enough land to support a hunter-gatherer lifestyle.

The first Bushman Affairs Commissioner was appointed in 1959. During the 1960s domestic animals were introduced into the area and a school, clinic and church established. By the late 1970's about 1 000 Ju/'hoansi were living in Tjum!kui, reliant on Government subsidies, and the death rate exceeded the birth rate.

This was at the time when Jamie Uys' film The Gods Must Be Crazy and John Marshall's film N!ai, Story of a !Kung Woman were made; they offer starkly different accounts of the lives of the Ju/'hoansi. Jamie Uys popularised romantic myths about the Bushmen with his film, these being that the Bushmen still live an isolated hunter-gatherer existence, are friendly and simple by nature, with no understanding of modern capitalist society. In contrast, John Marshall's film attempted to portray the reactions of the Ju/'hoansi to the harsh realities of life in Eastern Bushmanland. Instead of scenes which show Bushmen living an idyllic traditional existence, Marshall's footage shows images of violence, drunkenness and community disintegration. Whereas Marshall places the Ju/'hoansi in a specific time period, that of 1978, Uys' Bushmen seem to be timeless, stone age relics contextualised only by their encounters with white westerners. The films are a good example of the competitive discourses within western culture's attempts to represent the Bushmen.

In the 1980s a new debate arose. Nature Conservation wanted to declare Eastern Bushmanland a nature reserve, with only "traditional" Bushmen living there. Opponents of this scheme promoted large scale cattle farming. Yet others saw tourism as the future, and there were even plans to turn Tjum!kui into a large tourist camp. None of these schemes were fully implemented, but there is evidence of a little of everything in and around Tjum!kui.

John Marshall and Claire Ritchie started the Nyae Nyae Development Foundation in 1980 to help the Ju/'hoansi make necessary transitions. Since then boreholes have been sunk to provide water and encourage people to re-establish themselves in outlying areas where they keep cattle and engage in limited hunting and gathering activity. Tjum!kui still faces overcrowding and the social problems that accompany this; the rate of unemployment remains high and for many the only source of income is the sale of crafts to tourists or participation in activities like dancing for or hunting with tourists, usually organised by a foreign tour operator.

Legislation on community rights to wildlife resources "either through utilisation of wildlife resources for trophy hunting or through participation in tourism development projects" was proposed in 1994 by the Namibian Government in its White Paper on Tourism. The Ju/'hoansi are allowed to hunt with bow and arrows only, to prevent the shooting out of game in the area. They are a lso allowed to take tourists hunting with them, but until recently the community did not benefit from trophy hunting in the area.

A mixed economy is encouraged for the area, with domestic and wildlife farming, gardening and tourism, but elephants destroy the crops and water tanks and it is too expensive to erect electric fences. There are also many cases of lions killing the cattle given to the villagers by the local Development Foundation. Tourism is an economic activity which offers immediate financial benefits, and with the majority of people in the community unemployed, it comes as a blessing, but a mixed one.

For the Ju/'hoansi, deprived of adequate hunting grounds and opportunities for employment, immediate needs outweigh the benefits of long-term planning. This has resulted in unresolved tension between villagers who take part in tourist activities, and the Nyae Nyae Development Foundation which is attempting to create structures which have long term benefits for the community. Add to this equation the conflicting interests of conservation and agriculture, where wildlife and local communities compete for survival, and you begin to get an idea of just how complex the issues in a place like Eastern Bushmanland are.

My paper is based on empirical evidence for the most part, what I myself witnessed and experienced. However, I do situate my observations within the context of more theoretical work which has been done on the Bushmen debates and the tourist industry.

Initially I had a list of questions I wanted to ask about these various issues. I had brought with me copies of advertisements and newspaper articles, as well as the book produced in conjunction with the Miscast exhibition in Cape Town. I had hoped that these would help to stimulate discussion. Once the interviewing began, however, I realised that I had been much too ambitious. The interviewees had great difficulty understanding questions about representation, and translation further complicated the process. I then started using just the Spoornet calendar we had brought with us, showing people the pictures, asking questions about these and about the written text and listening to general comments. This worked very well in most cases and supplied me with helpful information.

I did not have enough time to spend with groups talking about the calendar as I was part of a team where each member had a different agenda, a different set of questions. Sometimes the questions asked by other members of the team were helpful and relevant to my research, but at other times I found the situation frustrating and time consuming. It also led to some conflict within the group.

Despite Bushmanland being situated in such a remote region of Namibia, our interviewees were really quite varied. They comprised villagers living in remote areas, location dwellers in Tjum!kui town, Ju/'hoansi co-operative members, health, development and conservation workers, Peace Corps teachers and a tour operator. Their nationalities were South African, American, Namibian, Dutch, Australian, and Zambian. Some of the interviews were formal while other information I gathered is based on casual conversations and chance encounters.

I soon realised that cultural tourism plays a much greater part in the community than I had previously thought. Every interview contained some discussion of tourists or tourism and the problems and benefits it offers the people of Eastern Bushmanland. Conflict between various parties quickly became apparent and we followed from lead to lead until these issues became the focus of the trip.

So my main objectives were displaced, because of interviewing difficulties and because of the recurrent theme of cultural tourism. This was not problematic, however, as cultural tourism is as much about representation as a film, book, advertisement or museum display. It is, in fact, the final commodification of culture, because in Eastern Bushmanland it is not just about sights or crafts, but people. My paper therefore focuses on my experiences of cultural tourism in Eastern Bushmanland, and its associated benefits and problems. Eastern Bushmanland is only one of many areas of the world where tourism is having a growing impact on local people and environment. I also discuss tourism as a concept and the symbolic aspects of the relationship between tourists and the host community. There are certainly both positive and negative aspects to cultural tourism which play off each other in complex and specific ways. These often depend on particular circumstances.

The most obvious benefit of tourism is economic. In an area where opportunities for economic gain are literally few and far between, the chance to earn money from dancing, hunting with tourists or selling crafts is readily taken. Money earned through this could mean improved living conditions, the education of one's children or the chance to break out of a cycle of dependency on government handouts. It is possible that tour operators may have a good relationship with locals and provide extra benefits , or lobby on behalf of the group. Unfortunately, relationships such as these are the exception to the rule and the reality of tourism in Eastern Bushmanland seemed to me to be exploitation by outsiders.

In 1996 there were about ten tour companies travelling through the area, with mostly German and American tourists. South Africans tend to go in on their own. We met a tour operator who was building a lodge in Tjum!kui to house guests who come to see the Bushmen and the wildlife. A night spent in one of his luxury huts, with a double bed and private bathroom, cost N$240 per person, excluding the three meals a day on offer at the main building. For this a further N$80 a day was charged. To hire a Landrover for the day cost the tourist N$550 plus the cost of fuel. The tour operator said he expected that most of his guests would be foreigners used to paying his kind of prices, and judging from the lodges we saw advertised throughout Namibia, his prices were standard.

He had set up agreements with a number of local villages with whom he was planning to work on a regular basis. Each of these villages has about five families. The older people participate in the activities, the younger people organise the activities and each village has a spokesperson who is able to act as a translator if necessary.

Out of the N$350 per person charged by the tour operator for a full day of traditional hunting with the Ju/'hoansi Bushmen, N$40 is given to the two or three hunters who take part in the activity to share between themselves, about N$15 each. The tour operator bears the cost of the petrol used transporting the tourist to the village and back.

Another example of economic exploitation is the use of Ju/'hoansi people for film and advertisements. Many villagers expressed their dissatisfaction with the small income derived from acting in films and for television.

In addition to this, prices paid for crafts are usually very low. Villagers are often forced to drop their prices to make a sale. A bow and arrow set sold for a mere N $20 in Tjum!kui goes for N$170 in a curio shop in Windhoek or at the Nyae Nyae Development Foundation's headquarters, also in Windhoek. The sale and export of crafts has the potential to draw isolated communities into the world economy, but it is seldom the producers of crafts who are in control of the export of their goods.

A potentially positive aspect of cultural tourism is the employment of local people in an area where unemployment is high, but again there are negative aspects to this. Research shows that adult males are favoured for employment, especially if they are able to speak English. Most adult males in Bushmanland can speak Afrikaans due to their contact with the SADF in the late 1970s. Our interpreter was an adult male who speaks Afrikaans and English, and many of the village spokespeople were men, although women did sometimes take the lead, but when this happened, it seemed to be based on age.

Another problem with tourism-orientated employment is that it is unstable. Labour may be withdrawn from the usual activities of the community to accommodate tourism, with the result that the subsistence economy of the area falls away or becomes ineffective. In Eastern Bushmanland traditional subsistence activities are ignored in favour of tourism-related activities. Government rations also encourage a culture of dependency. There are many other aspects to the problem, which I will not discuss here, but the repercussions of not gathering bushfoods are many. The younger community members don't learn about available bushfood, and people rely on the clinic for medicine instead of using traditional medicine obtained from the surrounding flora. It is also possible that agricultural activities are ignored and so no reliable subsistence system is built up. Tourism is often seen as a quick-fix for the problems of remote communities who cannot know of the consequences before they become realities.

In relation to this, advocates of cultural tourism often point out that the local community stands to benefit from the infrastructure which is necessarily created to accommodate tourists, such as shops or hospitals, roads or other transport facilities. But local people also stand to lose in the face of development of their area. In theory, land may be lost due to the establishment of tourist facilities or conservation areas for wildlife which attract tourists, and the urbanisation of an area may have negative influences on the local population, such as a rise in noise levels, alcoholism or even prostitution. The environment may be irrevocably altered by the continuous presence of visitors and the influx of large amounts of people can cause to stress to locals and to an environment not used to coping with high demands. To what extent is this true of Bushmanland?

The improvements made to roads in Eastern Bushmanland may benefit the locals in that it offers them greater access to the nearest large town, Grootfontein, but it also means that influx to the area is far easier and the flow of traffic far heavier. Many people use the road as a route to Botswana and this is having an obvious effect on the environment. The clinics in Tjum!kui exist for the benefit of local people and would have been built with or without the growth of tourism in the area. Shops have been opened in Tjum!kui for the supposed benefit of both locals and tourists, but prices are prohibitively high. The liquor store was closed down some years ago but has been replaced by numerous shebeens (drinking places), 17 in an area of 4 square kilometres, mainly run by Kavangos. Alcoholism is a problem in the area as are violence and the noise levels in the Tjum!kui location. It was not until the influx of outsiders to Eastern Bushmanland that alcohol became a problem as the brewing of beer is not part of traditional Bushmen culture.

Ideally, an isolated area may benefit from money spent locally by tourists, and the provision of foreign exchange is always welcome, but in Bushmanland tourists' money creates government revenue, or goes into the hands of tour operators, shop owners and foreign transport companies. Locals are only paid directly by tourists for crafts, and this money goes straight back into the hands of the shopowner when people buy the goods they need. Relationships of dependency have become the norm in Bushmanland and what modernization there is does not, for the most part, contribute to the alleviation of poverty. Tourism in Namibia does stimulate activity in supportive industries, but local communities are generally not part of these industries. Tourism in Bushmanland is still operated on an informal level and so the structures which usually surround tourism initiatives are lacking. Where there is foreign investment it is in the form of tour companies who do not invest their earnings back into the area or provide employment for locals. It seems that none of the positive aspects usually associated with tourism can be applied to Bushmanland without some drawback.

Another problem often associated with tourism is the invasion of privacy, and this is certainly something common to Bushmanland. Truckloads of people have been know to arrive at villages without permission, taking photographs and questioning residents without identifying themselves or their purpose. The tour operator we interviewed said that most tourists want to just walk into peoples' houses and look. Tourists seem to hold the belief that they have a right to view anything they please. Villagers are often left without compensation for the time they spend talking to tourists, researchers o r film crews. Although they usually demand money for photographs, there is no guarantee that visitors will respect their wishes and prices are seldom negotiated in advance. When agreements are made these are usually suggested by the visitor rather than the community, which is left to accept or decline the offer. Because of short-term needs, offers are likely to be accepted. Within our own group there was conflict over the payment of informants. Some of us felt that it was necessary to reimburse people for time spent talking to us instead of getting on with their usual activities, while others felt that it encouraged specific types of answers and relationships of dependency. My opinion is that not paying the Bushmen for their time is a perpetuation of the myth that they are idle and have no need for money.

Villagers are sometimes subject to abuse from tourists and have no real way of controlling the nature of interactions. This can lead to conflict between locals and visitors. Stuck out in the bush with no transport and no money, there is very little recourse for the Ju/'hoansi.

There has been, and still is, a fair amount of controversy and factionalism in Bushmanland over participation by villagers in tourism activities. Some villages have made agreements with tour operators, while others are rightfully resentful of their lack of control over such initiatives. Some villages would like to take part in activities which lead to economic gain but do not have the means to set up agreements or to attract tourists to their village in particular. Competition and disagreement over whether to enter into relationships of exchange with outsiders has led to tension and division within the community as a whole, and the involvement of the Nyae Nyae Development Foundation and Farmers Co-Operative is another dimension of a growing problem.

Most people agree that tourism has to be controlled if the area is to avoid being ruined, but just who should be in control of tourism? The Namibian government's claim that individual "ad-hoc " responses to tourism opportunities and problems merely provide short-term solutions to essentially long-term problems is one with which the Nyae Nyae Foundation would agree. Their aim is to ensure that agreements made between visitors and local people are beneficial to the Ju/'hoansi in the long run too. Shebby Mate, the resource manager at Baraka at the time, told us of instances where communities had signed contracts without really knowing what they were signing. This usually led to conflict and even loss of land in some cases. In the past, when people had the skills to survive anywhere as their lifestyle was relatively nomadic, this may not have been such a dramatic occurrence. Today, however, loss of land is far more dramatic because there is a lack of available land with a borehole or a natural waterpoint, and the youth do not have the skills necessary for survival.

The Foundation's policy is that independent tourists, tour operators, film crews and researchers should make arrangements with the Ju/'hoansi in and around Tjum!kui via the Foundation, so that fair agreements can be set up. But this has led some of the villagers to believe that the Foundation is trying to hold them back when they have a right to make agreements with whoever they choose. Their emphasis on short-term gain is understandable, but it does not help the Foundation, which is trying to prevent exploitation, not discourage people from earning extra income. However, the Foundation has no real means of enforcing its policy.

There are no easy solutions to the problems Bushmanland faces, which are more numerous than I can outline in this paper. The "better than nothing" attitude many people have to these kinds of issues is not acceptable when one sees firsthand the poverty-stricken conditions in which the Ju/'hoansi live. For cultural tourism to be a viable industry which benefits all parties, the development needs of rural communities need to be placed before the needs of the tourist, the researcher, the film maker or the investor. Interaction between local communities and visitors should ideally promote mutual awareness and respect, not resentment and dissatisfaction due to emphasis on differences.

My research, and the Graduate Programme in Cultural and Media Studies', is as a whole aimed at exploring the ways in which the myth of the Bushmen has been put to use by various media for various means. These media include films, literature, advertisements, the popular press, anthropological texts, museums, and of course the tourist industry (see Critical Arts, 1995). Bushmanland serves as a case study and a background to the claims I wish to make about the commodification of culture, and, ultimately, people. I have discussed to some extent already the social and economic effects tourism has on the area, but I want to look now specifically at the perceptions tourists and hosts have of themselves and of each other, and how these work to perpetuate myths not just about the Bushmen but about visitors too.

Tourism in its present form arose after World War 2 with improved communication and transportation, more leisure time due to increased industrialisation, increased interest in other cultures, safer and cheaper travel and the standardisation of facilities. It has its origins in the Crusades, pilgrimages, exploration, the Grand tour of the 19th Century and, I think, archaeology and anthropology, which are both products and agents of fascination with the exotic, the undiscovered and the other.

Tourism, and the leisure activities associated with it, has become something of a status symbol: it implies surplus wealth which can be spent on leisure pursuits and the tourist, though often mocked, is more often envied. The concept of tourism is based on the work ethic, where time in industrialised societies is quite strictly divided between work and leisure activity. It also has its roots in the binary oppositions which have been set up between country and city since the Industrial Revolution. Raymond Williams looks at this of course in his book The Country and the City. Tourism allows self-indulgence for a time, it is voluntary, it is unusual, it supposedly refreshes us and improves our health, it can be educational, inspiring, make us better people and give us new perspectives on life.

In her Introduction to a well-known and much-quoted collection of essays about tourism, Valene Smith distinguishes between Ethnic Tourism and Cultural Tourism. She gives examples of activities usually carried out during these tours. Ethnic tours involve visits to the homes and villages of indigenous people, the observation of dances and rituals, and the buying of curios and so-called "primitive" wares. The area visited is usually off the beaten path.

The activities of cultural tourism, however, are "eating meals in rustic inns, folklore performances, costumed wine festivals", which Smith describes as "peasant culture". She also uses numbers of tourists to distinguish between the two kinds of tourism, ethnic tourism attracting fewer people than cultural tourism, I assume because the areas are harder to get to and the activities are not as organised.

I myself do not subscribe to this division and use the two terms interchangeably; admittedly this Introduction was written in 1974 when studies of tourism as a phenomena were just beginning, but to exclude dances and rituals from the category of culture implies an elitist approach, perhaps even a Eurocentric one. The distinction seems to be based on the notion that cultural tourism, in Valene Smith's sense, is a set-up, for example a festival or a folklore performance, whereas ethnic tourism allows the tourist to see how indigenous people really live, what they eat, what customs they follow. My sense is that any activity which involves tourists is a set-up. The notion of an "authentic" experience is yet another gimmick designed to attract tourists. Ethnic tourism may seem more authentic because there are fewer people and the events are less organised but it is nevertheless a set-up in every case.

In another essay in the same collection, Theron Nunez refers to the dramaturgical studies of Erving Goffman. He uses the metaphor of a stage, with actors and an audience. Both the tourists and the host community are prepared for a performance of sorts, whether it is an organised activity, such as dancing, or just the sale of crafts. The tourists may have read a little about the area and its people, they have their cameras, money to buy crafts and so on. The host community assess their audience, put on a smile and assume their role as objects of fascination. They know which dance they will do and how much they are going to charge for their crafts.

Nunez admits that "we all wear many masks, but our performances are usually exaggerated before an audience of strangers for whom we must perform, often to the point of obfuscation." (1974: 213)

Davvyd J. Greenwood argues in his article on tourism as cultural commodification that "local culture...is altered and often destroyed by the treatment of it as a tourist attraction. It is made meaningless for the people who once believed in it". Certain cultural activities of the Ju/'hoansi have been altered to fit an image, to authenticate themselves in terms of common myths, while some aspects of their culture have been altogether eroded, this by many forces, including tourism. Traditionally, dancing in Bushmen culture was a healing activity for both individuals and the community as a whole. When dancing is done for tourists, the shamanistic elements are left out, and thus the dance no longer functions in the same way. It is merely acting for money.

It is easy to criticize cultural tourism and myth-making when it is initiated by outsiders, but the issues become rather more complex when the objects of fascination, in this case the Ju/'hoansi, begin to collude in myths about their own culture in order to make money. This collusion often leads to the belief that the host community is happy with tourism in their area, and their participation seems to give credence to cultural tourism as a whole.

Participation in tourist activities is regarded as a necessary resource and is thus not necessarily condoned or rejected. Few of the Ju/'hoansi have the knowledge necessary to understand the wider implications of cultural tourism and subsequent myth reinforcement. Some of the Ju/'hoansi are aware of this due to their exposure to debate, particularly those people who have had access to education or who work for the Foundation or Farmers' Co-Operative. At Baraka these issues are discussed on a regular basis by people who are not themselves relying on tourism as a form of income. The villagers who do rely on tourism are generally isolated from each other and in competition with each other. They do not have the luxury of discussing the impact of tourism on their community when they are caught up in trying to make a living from it.

I want to argue, however, that there are examples of resistance to culture commodification, whereby some of the Ju/'hoansi, in small but significant ways, seem to be holding onto meaning, maintaining some control over their culture and the ways in which it is commoditised. Again, there are many contradictions within this and I want to point these out too. I base my argument on an interview we carried out with a group whose village is on the road to Klein Dobe.

Dancing for tourists takes place in a fake village set up away from their village. It consists of a few grass huts which stand in a circle around a bare central space which has place for a fire and for people to dance. The separation of the tourist village from the village where the group lives is partly to give the group their privacy, but is mostly aimed at presenting the tourists with a sanitised space free from any western paraphernalia. Most villages consist of a variety of haphazard structures made up of natural and manufactured products.

The fake village fits perfectly the stereotype of a people who need nothing, live in harmony with nature and accumulate no material goods. In other words, it gives a sense of the hunter-gatherer lifestyle, a nomadic lifestyle where people do not stay for long in any place, and cannot acquire anything which is not functional or necessary for survival. One gets the impression that if the huts were to be torn down or the village simply deserted, the bush would take over again in a short space of time and any evidence of the Bushmen would soon disappear.

The real village, in contrast, has a cattle kraal, mud huts, perhaps a permanent structure, trees heavy with blankets and cl othing, plenty of litter and mangy dogs and hens everywhere. This image, in contrast to that of the tourist village, is one of a settled people, poverty-stricken, with no real infrastructure, no luxuries, and an ongoing battle with the elements and with w ildlife; lions which kill their livestock and elephants which trample their attempts at crop-growing. The people sit about in old torn clothes, barefoot, often with health problems and no way of getting their children to school.

When we interviewed the villagers it was at the tourist village. We had met them a few nights previously and they had said we could return. Our arrival was greeted by a gathering of people who then disappeared again one by one until we were left alone. We sat down and waited, watched by some children who eventually went back to their games and ignored us. Then people started drifting back again, two of them old men who had suddenly donned skins, evidence that they saw us as yet another group of tourists.

They told us during the interview that the skins were given to them by the tour operator who brings tourists to their village to watch their dancing. He bought the skins from the Reverend of the local Dutch Reformed Church, who usually sells them to tourists. The Reverend, in turn, bought them from other Ju/'hoansi villagers, so ironically, the Ju/'hoansi become consumers of commodities produced by their own culture.

They then told us about the dancing they do for tourists. Initially they said that the tourists decide what is going to be done, but then went on to say, "Sometimes we do the same dances for ourselves that we do for the tourists, but other times we do the `oelifant dans'(elephant dance). We don't do this dance for the tourists." They then described this dance and said further: "We don't do healing dances for tourists. When we dance for ourselves it is serious. When we dance for the tourists it is just for show."

It became very clear that there is a constructed separation between what the tourists are allowed to witness and what they are not given access to. If I follow the logic of my own argument that the Ju/'hoansi make little distinction between tourists and researchers, then by the same token we as researchers were also subject to controlled information and performance orientated behaviour. Everyday life and performance, the private and the public, become firmly separated binary oppositions. The clothes the Ju/'hoansi wear, the activities they engage in and the space in which they do these, all contribute to the set- u p tourists pay for. The host community assumes their role as "exotic hunter-gatherers" for their audience of curious tourists. They smile and dance and pose for photographs, "But we don't speak with the tourists" they told us, "because we want money and tourists just want to see us dance. They tell us what they want and we dance."

Language is another means of separating the private and the public for these people. Their's is a difficult language and when one remarks on this they do not encourage one to learn it by saying it is not that difficult, as we might to a second language English speaker, but agree with you that it is hard to learn. Our experience was also mediated by translation and a translator. Many times we asked a question which stimulated minutes of discussion amongst the Ju/'hoansi, only to be given a one sentence translation, so it was obvious that we were hearing a shortened version, a preferred version, a tactful version perhaps, but always another version. For the Ju/'hoansi language is a private sphere which operates effectively and allows a measure of control over events. The binary opposition of private and public can be regarded as a form of subtle resistance that dispels the myth of the friendly Bushmen.

These subtle forms of resistance may be short-lived however, and the Ju/'hoansi may well end up like many other commodified cultures. The group told us that "the young people also take part in the dancing. They learn it from the older people." This fits in very neatly with one of the positive aspects of cultural tourism I listed earlier, where there is a reinforcement of traditional culture, a pride in tradition, or a rekindling of ignored traditions. But the spokesperson for the group went on to say:"I don't know if they are interested in the dancing or if they just do it because the older people do it. I don't know if they like it or not." This reminded me of our being told that the older people participate in activities which are organised by the younger people. It also occurred to me that the youth who do dance are possibly only doing so for economic benefit, not out of any sense of pride or desire to reinforce their traditions. Most of the youth we spoke to wanted to be educated, wear good western clothing and find employment.

Interaction between tourists and the Ju/'hoansi relies heavily on stereotypes, on existing myths and binary oppositions. It is important to recognise here that interaction is a two-way process, that the act of viewing, of objectifying, goes both ways. We need to ask not only how tourists see the Bushmen, but how the Bushmen see visitors to the area. I use the term visitors here deliberately because the Ju/'hoansi make little distinction between tourists, film crews and researchers. Interactions do not differ greatly on the surface in the eyes of the Ju/'hoansi, whether they are dancing for tourists, acting for a film maker or answering the tedious questions of hundreds of researchers who pass through every village. \par \par And for the tourists, the film crews, the researchers, there is little noticeable difference between the people of one village and another; unless you stay long enough to get to know people this is inevitable. The signs and symbols which make up the stereotypes of "Tourist" and "Bushman" are readily identifiable and for the most part consistent, anticipated and expected.

Nunez writes that we cannot be certain of "how intergroup status relationships are shaped and shared. An understanding of these processes," he says," might shed sufficient light on the symbolic content of each culture, especially where a host community has the opportunity to stereotype and evaluate representatives of more than one nationality." (1974: 214)

In the encounter between tourist and bushman cultures, symbolic content relies heavily on visual representation to create meaning. The stereotypes of these encounters are reinforced by symbols or signs which are based on binary oppositions such as high and low status, poverty and wealth, work and leisure, modern and traditional, urban and rural, same and other. I want to give a few examples to show that these binary oppositions operate in very specific ways in Eastern Bushmanland.

A visitor, be they tourist, researcher or film maker, usually arrives at a village in a 4X4 vehicle, with modern western clothing, a wristwatch, sunglasses, a hat, boots, a camera, perhaps a notebook, or a tape recorder, or a video camera, perhaps jewellery. To the visitor, most of these items are everyday accessories. They may be status symbols, for example a Landrover, or a Rolex watch or Rayban sunglasses, but for the most part they are taken for granted. To be a tourist may in itself also be a status symbol for many westerners, but the middle class is generally conditioned to expect holidays or travel of some kind.

The Ju/'hoansi, in their donned skins, doing traditional dancing, manifest all the signs of a hunter-gatherer community living a simple life, in harmony with nature and with no need or desire for modern accessories, self-sufficient and independent of the modern world. They may still hunt and gather to a small extent in reality, they may still dance in their own time and they still wear the beads they make to sell as crafts to visitors.

To the host community, the Ju/'hoansi in this case, all the accessories worn or used by visitors are status symbols. Good clothes, any vehicle, any camera, any wristwatch, they are all signs of wealth, privilege, modernisation, leisure. They represent a specific group of people who come from a specific background.

For the visitor, the skins worn by the Ju/'hoansi, the straw huts and the lack of material goods are all positive signs, signs of people not yet alienated from the natural world, still living in harmony with their surroundings, with time to talk and skills necessary for survival. The Bushmen are the perfect antidote for the average westerner. Nelson Graburn sums this up well: "...their naturalness and simplicity exemplifies all that is good in Nature herself. What more exciting and uplifting experience could one imagine than to share a few words...with such delightful people?" Ethnic tourism, he adds, allows the tourist to approach Nature through "Her People"(1974: 27).

But the Ju/'hoansi's perception of themselves differs enormously. When we asked a group of villagers how they would portray themselves on film given the chance to do so, they told us they would wear skins to show the world how poverty-stricken they are. Hopefully then, they said, people would send them money or help them in some other way.

On the other hand, the Ju/hoansi cannot know about the everyday lives of their visitors, the tourist who works all year saving for a holiday and returns to work for another year after the holiday, or the film maker who has invested his life savings into the making of a film, or the researcher who is travelling on a small bursary, with a borrowed camera and a faulty tape recorder. I by no means want to trivialise the enormous disparities in wealth between the Ju/'hoansi and those who visit them, merely to point out the obvious about the way in which signs and symbols manifest themselves.

Dennison Nash refers to Simmel's theory of the stranger. "Simmel saw the stranger as a temporary sojourner who does not share the essential qualities of host group life. As a result, interaction between him and the host tends to take place on a more general, impersonal level. Simmel says,"Strangers are not really conceived as individuals, but as strangers of a particular type...Not only do strangers and their hosts treat each other as types but also as objects" (1974: 40).

In the case of Eastern Bushmanland, the tourist is there for entertainment, the film maker to make a movie, and the researcher to get information. The Ju/'hoansi are interested in the economic benefits these visitors represent. The tourist is a source of income and occasional curiosity. Not once while we were carrying out research did any of the villagers ask us a question about ourselves, our lives, our backgrounds, and they seemed disinterested in any information offered by us.

The realities of people's lives have no place in this kind of relationship of exchange; the symbols involved can seldom truthfully represent their bearers. Tourists do not know, or really want to know, about problems faced by their host community, and the hosts are not interested in the problems tourists have in their own lives. The two groups often have no idea about the living conditions of the other; they do not share the same language and their economic status forms an impenetrable barrier. The nature of the interaction between the two groups does not allow for or encourage the breaking down of stereotypes or the banishing of myths. Quite the opposite; it demands stereotypes and myths. The relationship of exchange between the two parties is analogous with that between actors and their audience. There is nothing without the mystery or fascination, at most, or the suspension of disbelief, at least. Both tourist and host have expectations which must be met and must exhibit behaviour which is appropriate to the situation.

CONCLUSION

The relationship between visitors and the Ju/'hoansi is immensely complex and this discussion only touches the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

Although I refer to "Bushmen culture" in this paper, I am specifically referring to Ju/'hoansi culture and am aware of the common misconception that the so-called Bushmen are an homogenous group of people with the same traditions. Even the Ju/'hoansi cannot be spoken of as a unified group. There is diversity in their responses to the transitions they are undergoing. Although cultural tourism depends on the myths about the Bushmen as an homogenous group for its success, in reality it is a catalyst for division. It also depends on the myths about the Bushmen remaining intact at the same time that it induces far-reaching changes. Added to this, while cultural tourism relies on the myth of the Bushmen as hunters it supplies an alternative form of income which undermines the need for the Bushmen to hunt at all.

The final paradox is that, as Roland Barthes wrote, demystification does not eliminate myth but gives it more freedom (Culler, 1983: 39) The more attention given to the Bushmen the more fascinated people become. Debate has not destroyed the myth of the Bush men, but simply generated new debate and a new generation of researchers, myself included

REFERENCES

Culler, J. (1983). Roland Barthes. Glasgow: Fontana.

Graburn, N.H.H. "Tourism: The Sacred Journey" In Hosts and Guests. Smith,V. (Ed). (1978). Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Greenwood, D. "Culture By the Pound: An Anthropological Perspective on Tourism as Cultural Commoditization" In Hosts and Guests. Smith,V. (Ed). (1978). Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Nash, D. "Tourisms as a Form of Imperialism" In Hosts and Guests. Smith,V. (Ed). (1978). Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Nunez,T. "Touristic Studies in Anthropological Perspective" In Hosts and Guests. Smith,V. (Ed). (1978). Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Skotnes, P. (1996). Miscast: Negotiating the Presence of the Bushmen. Cape Town: University of Cape Town Press.

Smith,V.L. (Ed). (1978). Hosts and Guests: The Anthropology of Tourism. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Tomaselli, K.G. (Ed). (1995) Critical Arts: Recuperating the San. Vol 9 (2)

Williams, R. (1973). The Country and the City. London: Chatto and Windus.

Notes
Gareth Morgan, an anthropology MA student, and I were invited to go to Eastern Bushmanland by Prof. Keyan Tomaselli from the Centre for Cultural and Media Studies, where I was registered as a PhD student. An MA student from that Centre, Kaitira Kandjii, was also invited. Kandjii is a Namibian and, more importantly, a Herero who grew up having contact with the San in Namibia. In Windhoek we met up with Sonja Speeter, a PhD student from Germany who was carrying out research on the work of Lorna Marshall in Eastern Bushmanland in the 1950's.

The funding for the trip was made available by the University of Natal Research Fund. Prof. Tomaselli was in the fourth year of a project dealing with topics related to visual anthropology with specific reference to representation of the San in the mass media.