Thanatourism, Caminata Nocturna, and the Complex Geopolitics of Mexico's Parque EcoAlberto

Abstract

This article provides readers with a critical analysis of Mexico's Parque EcoAlberto. Utilizing some of the theoretical work of interdisciplinary scholars who are interested in the study of “thanatourism,” the authors illustrate how this park, with its Caminata Nocturna (night hike), is much more than simply a “dark” tourist attraction that deters those who might travel North to the U.S. border. This study shows how the indigenous Hñähñú in Mexico have to confront a host of symbolic and material forces that are sometimes hidden in the patriotic metanarratives that swirl around this park.

Notes

Parque EcoAlberto is located just a 2–3 hour drive from Mexico City and more than 700 miles from the U.S. border. As we explain in more detail below, it is a tourist park that provides employment for many of the Hñähñú, the indigenous communities who live in that region. For some 10 years various press outlets have written or blogged about this site, and a filmmaker, Jamie Meltzer, has produced a film, La Caminata (the hike), that allows viewers to get a glimpse of a pedagogical site that allegedly helps with the deterrence of those who might be interested in trying to illegally cross into the United States.

René Girard, Violence and the Sacred (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977); Rene Girard, “Mimesis and Violence: Perspectives in Cultural Criticism,” Berkshire Review 14 (1979): 9–19.

Nancy Scheper-Hughes, Death Without Weeping: The Violence of Everyday Life in Brazil (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992).

Erika M. Robb, “Violence and Recreation: Vacationing in the Realm of Dark Tourism,” Anthropology and Humanism 34, no. 10 (2009): 56.

Robb, “Violence and Recreation,” 51–52. At the outset of this article let us admit that critical scholars may have some ambivalent feelings as they study the arguments of those who either complain about this park or those who celebrate the entrepreneurial spirit behind this venture. Others, who enjoy reading about neoliberal capitalism, will see nothing wrong with having local indigenous communities make money from middle-class or wealthy visitors who travel hundreds of miles to get the “border-crossing” experience. This all raises the question of whether there are better ways of representing the plight of South Americans, Central Americans, Mexicans, and others who have to cope with the hegemonic powers of those who control several borders.

Zitláli Sánchez, “Turismo negro: Parque EcoAlberto, turismo negro en Ixmiquilpan Hidalgo, simulacro o realidad del fenómeno migratorio, México 2011–2012,” Turismo Negro, November 16, 2011, http://zitlali-turismonegro.blogspot.com.

The coauthor who visited this site is not a member of the Hñähñú community. By U.S. standards, he is a Mexican of indigenous ancestry—Rarámuri to be specific. By U.S. standards he is mestizo (in Mexico the word mestizo is also part of a colonial caste system) and, therefore, not wholly indigenous and not exactly White. To reiterate, these dimensions are particularly important, and they will be addressed in more detail near the end of the article.

Britta T. Knudsen, “Deportation Day: Live History Lesson,” Museum 63, no. ½ (2011): 109–134.

See Mary Louise Pratt, “Arts of the Contact Zone,” Profession 91 (1991): 33–40.

Philip R. Stone, “A Dark Tourism Spectrum: Toward a Typology of Death and Macabre Related Tourist Sites, Attractions, and Exhibits,” Tourism 54, no. 2 (2006): 145.

Ibid., 145–146.

Emma Willis, Theatricality, Dark Tourism and Ethical Spectatorship (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2014).

Miguel Vatter, “Eternal Life and Biopower,” CR: The New Centennial Review 10, no. 3 (Winter 2010): 217–249, doi:10.1353/ncr.2010.0035.

Michael Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. I, An Introduction, trans. R. Hurley (New York: Vintage Books, 1990), 137.

Britta Timm Knudsen, “Thanatourism: Witnessing Difficult Pasts,” Tourist Studies 11 (2011): 56, doi:10.1177/1468797611412064.

Robb, “Violence and Recreation,” 56.

For example, some defenders of dark tourism studies admonish us to remember that we have a responsibility to look, and to study, all sorts of administrative atrocities, murders, etc., so that we “never again” have to witness some of the thanatopolitical practices of the past.

Joan Farber McAlister, “Collecting the Gaze: Memory, Agency and Kinship in the Women's Jail Museum, Johannesburg,” Women's Studies in Communication 36 (2013): 4–5.

Mona Friedrich and Tony Johnston, “Beauty versus Tragedy: Thanatourism and the Memorialisation of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide,” Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change 11, no. 4 (2013): 302–320, doi:10.1080/14766825.2013.852565.

A. V. Seaton, “Guided by the Dark: From Thanatopsis To Thanatourism,” International Journal of Heritage Studies 2, no. 4 (1996): 234-244.

Peter Slade, “Gallipoli Thanatourism: The Meaning of Anzac,” Annals of Tourism Research 30, no. 4 (2004): 779–794, 779, doi:10.1016/S0160-7383(03)00025-2.

Stuart Murray, “Thanatopolitics: Reading in Agamben: A Rejoinder to Biopolitical Life,” Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies 5, no. 2 (2008): 203–207, 206.

John Lennon and Malcolm Foley, Dark Tourism: The Attraction of Death and Disaster (London: Continuum, 2000), 58.

Thomas Blom, “Morbid Tourism—A Postmodern Market Niche with an Example from Althorp,” Norsk Geografisk Tidsskrift – Norwegian Journal of Geography 54 (2000): 29–36, doi:10.1080/002919500423564.

Choong-Ki Lee, Lawrence J. Bendle, Yoo-Shik Yoon, and Myung-Jay Kim, “Thanatourism or Peace Tourism: Perceived Value at a North Korean Resort from an Indigenous Perspective,” International Journal of Tourism Research 14, no. 1 (2012): 71–90, doi:10.1002/jtr.836.

Robert Shandley, Tazim Hamal, and Aniela Tanase “Location Shooting and the Filmic Destination: Transylvanian Myths and the Post-Colonial Tourism Enterprise,” Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change 4, no. 3 (2006): 137–158.

Robb, “Violence and Recreation,” 52.

Mark Bowman and Phaedra Pezzullo, “What's So ‘Dark’ about ‘Dark Tourism'?: Death, Tours, and Performance,” Tourist Studies 9, no. 3 (2009): 199.

Robb, “Violence and Recreation,” 56.

Bowman and Pezzulo, “What's So Dark,” 190.

Ella Morton, “Parque EcoAlberto: Home of the Illegal Border-Crossing Tourism Experience,” Slate, June 20, 2014, http://www.slate.com/blogs/atlas_obscura/2014/06/20/caminata_nocturna_at_parque_ecoalberto_is_an_illegal_border_crossing_experience.html. For more on the significance of the 10th anniversary, see Arturo González, “Parque Eco Alberto Festejará 10th aniversario de Caminata Nocturna,” Via Libre, last modified July 18, 2014, http://www.diariovialibre.com.mx/parque-eco-alberto-festejara-10o-aniversario-de-caminata-nocturna/.

Sara Gates, “‘La Caminata’ Gives Tourists A Simulated Illegal Border-Crossing Experience,” The Huffington Post, last modified September 21, 2012, para. 4, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/09/caminata-illegal-border-crossing_n_1866023.html.

Maribel Garcia, quoted in Irena Zhorov and Fronteras, “Mexican Amusement Park Offers Fake Border Crossing Attraction,” PBS Newshour, last modified June 24, 2013, para. 4, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/fake-border-crossing-is-amusement-park-attraction/.

Reed Johnson, “Mexican Town Offers Illegal Immigration Simulation Adventure,” The Los Angeles Times, last modified May 24, 2008, http://www.latimes.com/world/mexico-americas/la-et-border24-2008may24-story.html#page=1.

Ibid., para. 3.

For those who might be tempted to visit this park, Eco Alberto has put together their own Web page that helps potential visitors plan their tours. See Eco Alberto, Caminata Nocturna, 2014, http://www.ecoalberto.com.mx/CAMINATA.php.

Natalie Alvarez, “Fronteras Imaginarias: Theorizing Fronterizidad in the Simulated Illegal Border Crossings of Alberto, Mexico,” Journal of Dramatistic Theory and Criticism (Spring 2011): 24.

Johnson, “Mexican Town Offers,” para. 10.

Robb, “Violence and Recreation,” 52.

Knudsen, “Deportation Day,” 110.

Ian Urbina and Catherine Rentz explain that ICE cells are controversial solitary confinement cells used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. On an average day, 300 immigrants are kept in solitary confinement—confinement ranging from 15 to over 75 days. These confinements are controversial because detainees are held on civil charges, not criminal charges. Solitary confinement is a practice of punishment, yet detainees in ICE cells are confined “to ensure that they appear for administrative hearings” (para. 4). ICE cells are spaces associated with depression and suicide, and psychiatric experts agree that detainees are “at risk for severe metal harm” (para. 2). For more on ICE cells, see Ian Urbina and Catherine Rentz, “Immigrants Held in Solitary Cells, Often for Weeks,” New York Times, March 23, 2013, para. 1–4, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/24/us/immigrants-held-in-solitary-cells-often-for-weeks.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0.

McAlister, “Collecting the Gaze,” 14.

Jean Baudrillard, Simulations (New York: Semiotext[e], 1983), 25.

Borderland Beat, “Zetas Massacre 72 Illegal Immigrants in San Fernando Tamaulipas,” August 26, 2010, http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2010/08/zetas-massacre-72-illegal-immigrants-in.html.

Borderland Beat, “A Nightmare of the Massacre in San Fernando,” April 18, 2011, http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2011/04/nightmare-of-massacre-in-san-fernando.html.

See Michelle Holling, “‘So My Name is Alma, and I'm the Sister of … ': A Feminicidio Testimonio of Violence and Violent Identifications,” Women's Studies in Communication 37, no. 3 (2014): 313–338.

Rwddael Argonar Nyrennsen. “Caminata nocturna Parque EcoAlberto,” Las Puertas de Annwn. Blog, August 19, 2009, http://rwddael.blogspot.com/2009/08/caminata-nocturna-parque-ecoalberto.html.

Jamie Meltzer, La Caminata.

For more British coverage of the park, see Daily Mail Reporter, “Mexican Town Cashes in By Offering Tourists Illegal Border Crossing Experience,” Mail Online, last modified September 99, 2012, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2200689/Mexican-town-cashes-offering-tourists-illegal-border-crossing-experience-Thrill-seekers-chased-dark-wilderness-gun-wielding-border-patrol-agents.html.

Oddity Central Staff, “Experience Life as Illegal Alien at Mexico's Border-Crossing Theme Park,” Oddity Central, last modified June 13, 2012, http://www.odditycentral.com/pics/experience-life-as-an-illegal-alien-at-mexicos-border-crossing-theme-park.html.

Morton, “Parque EcoAlberto,” para. 1.

Patrick O'Gilfoil Healy, “Heads Up: Hidalgo, Mexico; Run! Hide! The Illegal Border Crossing Experience,” The New York Times, last modified February 4, 2007, para. 7, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E02E0DB143FF937A35751C0A9619C8B63.

Ibid., para. 30.

Morton, Parque EcoAlberto,” para. 5.

Both these sentiments appeared in Donna Westlund, “The Caminata Nocturna is a Simulated Illegal U.S. Border Crossing Event,” Liberty Voice, last modified March 22, 2014, http://guardianlv.com/2014/03/the-caminata-nocturna-is-a-simulated-illegal-u-s-border-crossing-event/.

Corey Adwar, “This Bizarre Mexican Part Simulates Illegal Border Crossings,” Business Insider, April 29, 2014, para. 2–4, http://www.businessinsider.com/mexicos-parque-ecoalberto-border-crossings-2014-4.

Gates, “La Caminata,” para. 9.

Julian Garcia, quoted in Sara Gates, “‘La Caminata’ Gives Tourists,” para. 13.

It should come as no surprise that some Arizona journalists could not help writing about the park. Claire Lawton, “La Caminata Theme Park in Mexico Gives Visitors a Chance to ‘Cross’ A simulated Border,” Phoenix New Times, last modified September 11, 2012, http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/jackalope/2012/09/la_caminata_simulated_border_theme_park_immigration.php.

Johnson, “Mexican Town Offers,” para. 3.

Maribel Garcia, quoted in Zhorov and Fronteras, “Mexican Amusement Park,” para. 6.

Johnson, “Mexican Town Offers,” para. 13.

Sara Gates, “‘La Caminata’ Gives Tourists,” para. 2.

Ella Schmidt and Maria Crummet, “Heritage Re-Created: Hidalguenses in the United States and Mexico,” in Indigenous Mexican Migration in the U.S., eds. Jonathan Fox and Gaspar Rivera-Salgado (La Holla, California: Centre for U.S.-Mexican Studies, 2004), 403.

Alicia Schmidt Camacho, Migrant Imaginaries: Latino Cultural Politics in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands (New York: New York, UP, 2008).

Gates, “La Caminata,” para. 11.

In her own work, Gayatri C. Spivak critiqued what she called a “positive essentialism” that critics needed to strategically use in visible ways for political interests Gayatri C. Spivak, “Subaltern Studies: Deconstructing Historiography,” in In Other Worlds: Essays in Cultural Politics (New York: Rutledge, 1988), 205.

Zhorov and Fronteras, “Mexican Amusement Park,” para. 1–2.

Homi K. Bhabha, The Location Of Culture (London: Rutledge, 1994).

“Poncho” [Alfonso Martinez], quoted in Patrick O'Gilfoil Healy, “Heads Up: Hidalgo, Mexico; Run! Hide! The Illegal Border Crossing Experience,” The New York Times, last modified February 4, 2007, para. 10.

James Spring, quoted in Adwar, “This Bizarre Mexican Park,” para. 10.

Jazmin Arely Moreno Alcazar quoted in Zhorov and Fronteras, “Mexican Amusement Park” para. 19.

Johnson, “Mexican Town Offers,” paragraph 19.

Ibid., para. 33.

Sergio Mendieta, quoted in Johnson, “Mexican Town Offers,” para. 7.

Alvarez, “Fronteras Imaginarias,” 32.

Delfino Santiago, quoted in Johnson, “Mexican Town Offers,” para. 16.

Mexican Reporter Staff, “Illegal Border Crossing-for Tourists,” MexicoReporter.com, last modified May 22, 2008, para. 6, http://www.mexicoreporter.com/2008/05/22/illegal-border-crossing-for-tourists/.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Marouf A. Hasian

Marouf A. Hasian, Jr., Department of Communication, University of Utah.

Jose Angel Maldonado

Jose Angel Maldonado, Department of Communication, University of Utah.

Kent A. Ono

Kent A. Ono, Department of Communication, University of Utah.