Exploring empowerment within the Gullah Geechee cultural heritage corridor: implications for heritage tourism development in the Lowcountry

Abstract

While scholarship on the Gullah Geechee (GG) people has been extensive, little research has examined heritage tourism's potential to empower or disempower the GG. In an attempt to shed light on this, the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor (GGCHC) was chosen as a case-study site because of its 2006 designation by Congress to protect and promote the unique attributes of the GG's cultural heritage. Qualitative interviews were conducted to unearth how heritage tourism was psychologically, socially, politically and economically empowering or disempowering the GG. The interviews described heritage tourism as having both the potential to be a positive force for good, as well as destructive. Specific positive examples of empowerment discussed were increased pride in being GG, tourism providing opportunities for community members to come together around certain initiatives such as the Sweetgrass Basket Festival, tourism being a ‘carrot’ to clear heirs’ property issues, and the many economic opportunities associated with tourism in the Lowcountry. One example of disempowerment which transcended all four dimensions of empowerment was the claim that frauds were posing as GGs and attempting to benefit from the current renaissance surrounding the culture. Implications to the marketing and management of Lowcountry heritage tourism are discussed.

Keywords:

• Gullah Geechee
• empowerment
• heritage tourism
• sustainable tourism
• impacts of tourism
• Lowcountry tourism

Notes on contributors

B. Bynum Boley is an Assistant Professor of Natural Resources Recreation and Tourism within the Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources at the University of Georgia. His research interests largely focus on sustainable tourism with a specific interest in the unique natural and cultural resources of tourism destinations. These innate natural and cultural features interest him because he sees the sustainable management and marketing of them as being vital to two of the primary goals of tourism development: (1) the ability to effectively attract tourists and achieve a competitive advantage and (2) having residents that are proud and supportive of the tourism industry within their community.

Cassandra Johnson Gaither is a research social scientist with the Southern Research Station in Athens GA. Her research interests address human perceptions and interactions with nature and the environment. She has published research addressing social group visitation to wildland recreation areas, environmental justice as this relates to minority, lower income groups, and immigrant access to outdoor recreation facilities, and more recently, the intersection of socially vulnerable populations and climate change.

Notes

1. The names Gullah and Geechee are used together in the paper following the GGCHC's attempt to show the similarities between the two groups. When used separately, Gullahs have been traditionally identified as those living in the SC and NC portions of the corridor, and Geechees those within the GA and FL portions of the corridor.

2. The term ‘Lowcountry' has been traditionally reserved for the 200-mile (322-kilometer) stretch of coastal South Carolina and Georgia (Bopp, 2015), but with the creation of the GGCHC, the paper extends it to the 30-mile wide strip of land extending from Pender County, North Carolina, down to St. John's County, Florida in the south (Figure 1).

3. FL and NC were not included in this exploratory study because of the limited time and budget of the trip. GA and SC also make up the heart of the GGCHC with large-scale tourism sites such as Savannah, Charleston, SC and Hilton Head Island, SC.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by USDA, Forest Service Southern Research Station [14-JV-11330144-063].