The research question addressed by this dissertation is: How is the tourist experience
formed and what constitutes the authenticity of the tourist experience for two market
segments (motivated and not motivated by learning) of tourists visiting (political) cultural
heritage sites in South Africa. The study explores the correlation between three types of
authenticity, namely objective, constructed and existential on two independent tourist
samples, motivated and not motivated by learning.
This research was initiated for three reasons. The first reason forms part of the research
problem; South African cultural experiences received the lowest ratings from the
international tourists despite the fact that culture and heritage play a role in reimaging
South Africa from Big 5 destination into ‘It’s possible’ and ‘Leave ordinary behind’. It was
suspected that not all types of cultural heritage products justify such a low ratings,
especially not the political cultural heritage sites South Africa is famous for. The second
reason emerged from the academic literature on authenticity theories and calls from the
influential group of postmodernist scholars to declare the objective authenticity obsolete
and replace it with the existential authenticity. The argument that; the hyperreal nature of
the postmodern experience and its detachment from reality makes the authenticity of the
site redundant, seemed inapt for cultural heritage sites exclusively dependent on their
historical and authentic values. The third reason was the inability of the postmodern
paradigm to explain the new tourism phenomenon driven by the tourists search for selfdevelopment
through authentic experiences. The new emerging paradigm, transmodernity
seemed to offer better theoretical framework in explaining the omnivorouessness of
tourists’ consumption and the authentic nature of tourist experiences.
The correlational character of the research question required a descriptive correlational
design and quantitative methodology. The selected research instrument for primary data
collection is a self–administered questionnaire. The sampling strategy is a non–probability
sampling, and the sampling method is a convenience or accidental sample. The data was
collected from November 2010 to February 2011 at the Constitutional Hill National
Heritage Site in Johannesburg. The final sample (436) consists of 254 foreign and 182
domestic tourists.
The questionnaire was designed to identify the variables pertinent to each type of
authenticity of tourists experience and of the resultant tourist experience. The data
analysis provided very interesting results. Firstly, the results of crosstabulation proved that
more than half (56%) of the tourists expressed strong agreement that the Constitution Hill
provided them with authentic experience, hence a proof that political heritage sites are not
responsible for the overall low experiential ratings of the country’s culture and heritage.
Secondly, the results of the Spearman’s correlation coefficient proved that objective
authenticity as an independent variable have strong positive correlation with constructed
and existential authenticity hence a proof that objective authenticity cannot be declared
obsolete and replaced with existential authenticity. Finally, the results of the t–test proved
that motivation for learning and place of birth do not play an important role in how tourist
evaluate and experience the authenticity of the site pointing to the omnivorous nature of
tourist consumption. In line with the transmodern paradigm, motivation for learning plays a
critical role in triggering the transformative, authentic experience distinctive of the
existential authenticity. The results of the study also showed that 32% of tourists are in
fact the purposeful, New Age, transmodern Cultural Creatives. Proposed theoretical
model of authenticity of tourists experience presents a theoretical platform for future
research studies. / Thesis (M.A. (Tourism))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2012.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:NWUBOLOKA1/oai:dspace.nwu.ac.za:10394/7606 |
| Date | January 2011 |
| Creators | Ivanovic, Milena |
| Publisher | North-West University |
| Source Sets | North-West University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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