2011年5月20日

Why go anywhere? Thinking about Coyote

Part I

 While preparing this week's blog, I wanted to gain a little perspective on Coyote magazine's editorial project and refresh my memory about Europe's invention of tourism. So I did a little reading about the "Grand Tour".

The Grand Tour was a tradition among Northern European and English elites mostly during the 17^th to the 19^th centuries. As a social practice, it was a gateway to life as an educated and cultured citizen. By the late 18^th century, the practice had also become popular with wealthy Americans.

The Grand Tourist was a young person often in his (or less so her) twenties from a wealthy family and well educated. After finishing a local education, they set out to travel across Europe, going first to Paris. From Paris they might cross the Alps for a destination in northern Italy or travel by ship to the Mediterranean. In any case, the journey would eventually lead to Rome and Venice. Sometimes the traveler might stay for a while (a few weeks or months), but in many cases the Grand Tour was simply the predecessor to the 7 cities in 21days tourism that became so popular in 1960's.

The Tour began as a very refined idea and an expression of European liberal idealism.

Here the thoughtful reader/writer travels through foreign lands recording his observations, refining his thinking and broadening his experience. The hope is that travel will make him wiser and a more valuable contributor to his society.  So even at it most noble origins, there was an exchange value attached to travel. Travel was currency.

Maybe it was this currency value that later caused us to question the real worth of travel.

In America, when I was growing up, travel was very much about "spectacle" - about finding exotic places and acquiring goods unavailable at home.

However, by late-century all of this came under suspicion in the face of rising globalization and ever diversifying multilateralism. During this period critics of tourism began to alert us to the terrible social, economic and ecological impacts of increased travel. At the same time, the world's populations became increasingly migratory.

The meaning of difference and distance began to change. And the idea of travel as, "fun

for rich people" began to loose its appeal.

The thought was, if tourism was going to widen the gap between rich and poor in the various holiday destinations, create classes of people trapped in service economies and unleash havoc on local ecologies, why would the thoughtful person want to travel?  How could we be sensitive to all these diverse needs and still satisfy our desires to learn about the world, broaden our perspective and deepen our experience without travel?

With these thoughts in mind I started out to Studio Y3 for a talk with Toshinori Arai,

Editor and Chief of Coyote Magazine.

In the interest of full disclosure, I've been a fan since 2004 and have among my cherished books Coyote, issue No. 1. Our conversations covered a wide range of subjects, but we never once mentioned the Grande Tour, eco-tourism or any of the concerns a person might bring to the questions of travel, or travel writing. Instead we talked about pinhole cameras, coffee, boatbuilding and friends. There was a moment when, with some pause, I thought I might ask about his editorial practice. His answer reassured and surprised me.

This is where I want to slow down. So I'm going to write about his response in the next edition. More soon.

Paul Venet

Paul Venet 03イベント