A Fez for the Heart Response

a.     Choose one passage from the reading that you found particularly interesting.  Why was this interesting?

First paragraph on page 5.

I thought it was interesting because the people that live in that town do not think much of the ruins. Visitors come to see the ruins even on the hottest days. I just find it interesting how the locals don’t think much of the beauty and ruins. Also, hearing that locals never undressed on the beach and the narration of people undressing on the beach was funny.

b.    Use examples from this reading to illustrate the interaction between economics and culture.

The Muslim population in Pomegranate did not like when the visitors would come into town in their bathing suits, so they put of signs to not do it. Then more and more tourists came in to the town, the locals noticed wanted there business. So some of the locals took down the “No Bikini” signs and used them for advertising. They eventually sold postcards with topless women saying, “No Problem in Turkery”.

The locals said, “Life used to be fun. Now it’s just business.” Their old way of living was over and they had to adapt to the modern, liberal way of doing things.

The food they now sold included foreign foods while displaying their food as “authentic Turkish cuisine”.

           

In order for the locals to keep up with the business with the tourists, they had to conform to modern Europe. This includes the ideals of the Western world. They did resist however. They put up the signs to stop women from walking around in bikinis, but that was short lived. Also, wearing the fez was legal if you were dealing with tourists and tourists were allowed to wear the fez even when it was illegal for locals to wear it in any other circumstance. The entire towns way of life changed within 20 years due to the overwhelming demand from tourists.

c.     Beyond the specific example of this town in Turkey, what connections or conflicts do you see between tourism and economics or tourism and culture?

Tourism brings in the demand for certain businesses to come up. In towns with a lot of tourism, the streets are filled with businesses that accommodate their needs. It’s very obvious when you walk through one of these streets that the businesses are meant for tourists. The tourists shape the economy of the town to meet their demands.

Large influxes of tourism can also change the culture in a town, as it did in Pomegranate. The cultural ideals had to change in Pomegranate because the culture the tourists brought with them was overwhelming and unstoppable, but that doesn’t mean there is no resistance. Pomegranate’s culture did try to resist or hold on to some of its “old” culture but eventually they had to conform.