Can things be good tour guides?

Research output: Contribution to journalConference proceedings published in a journalpeer-review

Abstract

'Can things be good tour guides? This paper addresses how ‘inanimate’ objects might operate as tour guides in a site of heritage tourism. We will approach this question theoretically through the neo-vitalism of Jane Bennett (with her adaptations of Bergsonian ideas) and her ideas about ‘vibrant matter’: how things have effective presence over and beyond the descriptions, reproductions and affects they generate in humans. We ask what might happen if one were to recruit such a presence into the role of a guide to the materiality, narratives and metaphors of a site. We have approached this question practically by creating a tour ‘guided’ by objects that we call ‘things-meanings’. The site of this tour is the early twentieth Castle Drogo designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens (‘the last castle to be built in England’), a National Trust property in Devon (UK) and popular tourism venue. We describe the way that the objects were created in materials relevant to, or already found in, the building and how an accompanying map plays a wayfinding role in the tour.
Original languageEnglish
Number of pages0
JournalDefault journal
Volume0
Issue number0
Early online date1 Apr 2016
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 1 Apr 2016
EventInternational Research FORUM on Guided TOURS - Estoril, Portugal
Duration: 19 Mar 201521 Mar 2015

Keywords

  • Castle Drogo
  • Objects
  • 'things-meanings’
  • Tour guide
  • Vibrant Matter

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