Exploring Nature, Making the Nation: The Spatial Politics of Ecotourism in Lebanon

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

3 Scopus citations

Abstract

This article explores how Lebanese ecotourism sites and excursions present a spatial narrative marked by aspirations for a consolidated nation that connects the rural and the urban across a diverse ecological terrain. Employing several ecotourism projects as case studies, I argue that ideas about nation-making that are rooted in embodied interaction with and awareness of the natural landscape engender a form of national territorialization that relies not upon staying "in place" but rather through the very mobility of the citizen-traveler across the national space. A central aim of my analysis of ecotourism, in a country strained by geographical divisions entangled with complex issues of national belonging, is to broaden the conversation within anthropology about the political life and spatial dimensions of domestic tourism within the Global South.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)64-78
Number of pages15
JournalPolitical and Legal Anthropology Review
Volume39
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - May 1 2016

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 American Anthropological Association.

Keywords

  • Conflict
  • Lebanon
  • Nation
  • Space
  • Tourism

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Anthropology
  • Sociology and Political Science
  • Law

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Exploring Nature, Making the Nation: The Spatial Politics of Ecotourism in Lebanon'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this