Selling Anthropocene space: situated adventures in sustainable tourism

Abstract

The Anthropocene is a proposed technical term for a new geological timeframe, but it is also a conceptual tool with the potential to redefine the stakes of contemporary environmental politics. One facet that is often overlooked is that the Anthropocene is a concept with commercial potential, even if the term itself has not been widely adopted. This article presents an investigation of the commercial potential of the Anthropocene idea through the lens of self-described sustainable tourism ventures in The Bahamas. These examples demonstrate some of the ways in which Anthropocene imaginaries participate in the recreation, redesign, and rebranding of specific spaces as emergent “tourism products”, specifically the small island farm and the anthropogenic coral reef. The goal is twofold: (1) to explore the symbolic and material creativity of the Anthropocene idea as its themes are used to extend capitalist innovation, and (2) to examine the Anthropocene idea as a strategy that builds upon existing histories of inequality to enable transnational accumulation in particular locales. As a situated adventure, this article articulates a reflexive mode of political ecological research for the Anthropocene that is equipped to critically articulate emergent practices at the intersection of postcolonial tourism, environmental conservation, and sustainable development.

Keywords:

• Branding
• sustainable tourism
• island tourism
• agritourism
• climate change
• coral reefs

Declaration statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 For a definition of tourism products, see Jefferson and Lickorish “1991).

2 Bahamian demographic information comes from the CIA Factbook, last updated in 2015 https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/bf.html

3 In 2014, tourist arrivals to New Providence were recorded at 3.5 million (Tourism Today, 2014).

4 Current projections do point to modest growth in tourism arrivals (WTTC, "2017), although these projections are based on the development of the Baha Mar Resort and Casino project that has had a very fraught history (Vora, “2017) and which is not yet contributing significantly to growth at the time of this writing.

5 The existence of "wilderness" has been debated for some time, but it takes new shape in the debates around the utility of the Anthropocene idea ( (Graef, 2016; Kareiva, Marvier, & Lalasz, 2012; Purdy,((2017)). Anthropocene fever. Aeon. Retrieved from https://aeon.co/essays/should-we-be-suspicious-of-the-anthropocene-idea"2017).

6 This paradise imaginary in The Bahamas has also been documented by Bahamian scholar, Krista Thompson, as “a domesticated version of the tropical environment and society” also known as the “Caribbean Picturesque” created through visual processes of “tropicalization” (Thompson, (2007). An eye for the tropics: Tourism, photography, and framing the Caribbean Picturesque. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press. “2007, quoted in Nixon, (2015). Resisting paradise: Tourism, diaspora, and sexuality in Caribbean culture. Jackson, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi. “2015, p. 126)

7 The Bahamian island of Andros has been designated by the government as a site for industrial scale agricultural production and agricultural education, thus far with relatively limited results in terms of offsetting reliance on imports.

8 I do not show or quote actual advertising materials for either product because this would further risk revealing the identities of these operations.

9 There is now an underwater sculpture garden adjacent to the coral nursery that also can be accessed outside of the purview of the dive shop. The nursery itself was damaged in Hurricane Matthew in late 2016 and has yet to be fully restored.

10 There are of course other emblems of anthropogenic global change, for example mammals like the polar bear and whales, and these certainly have a tradition of spurring environmental protest and action (e.g. see Kristoffersen, Norum, & Kramvig, 2016 on the “new whale”).

11 The examples Nixon (2015) cites are The Current Art Gallery run by John Cox at the Baha Mar Resort and Casino in The Bahamas (circa 2014), the Bahamian Educulture organization founded by Arlene Nash-Ferguson, and the Blackspace program designed by Erna Brodber in Jamaica.

12 Other examples of Anthropocene spatial products are still few and far between in The Bahamas, but they include ventures like “the Development” in Abaco (Moore, 2015a, see also Moore, 2015b) and the infrastructural design of large resorts that have made attempts to innovate in sustainable energy use and waste recycling.

Additional information

Funding

Fulbright Scholar Program; Wenner-Gren Foundation.

Notes on contributors

Amelia Moore

Amelia Moore has a BA in Environmental Biology from Columbia University and a PhD in Sociocultural Anthropology from the University of California Berkeley. She has been conducting social research in The Bahamas since 2002.