Student: Robin Zeller
Graduation date: May 2015
Capstone type: Thesis (honors)
Capstone project:
Recreating the Sacred Landscape: Tourism and Pilgrimage in Himalayan Sacred Places Under the Economic, Social, and Political Conditions of Modernity
Capstone file(s): Show file | Show file
Increasing pilgrim and tourist traffic at sacred sites inspires us to examine why and how pilgrims and tourists interact with ecosystems and local cultures at these sacred places. Despite the destructive potential of tourism and pilgrimage, sacred places can motivate outsiders and locals to preserve ecosystems within these spaces. In this paper, I examine this issue in the context of Himalayan sacred places. I explore how colonial and religious history has shaped both tourist and pilgrimage travel to the Himalayan region and how this molding has affected the modern impacts of both. I demonstrates this phenomenon through two case studies: one conducted by myself in Pharping, Nepal, another examining Shangri-La in the Yunnan province of the Tibetan Autonomous Region of China. Using these examples of the interactions between pilgrims, tourists, and local cultures and ecosystems at sacred sites, I examine the extent to which ‘sacredness’ can drive ecological and cultural preservation in the modern world. I contend that the tourist and pilgrim creation of Himalayan sacred spaces as outside of political and economic realms is problematic considering their impacts on ecosystems and societies at these sites. In order to adequately preserve cultural and ecological elements of sacred sites, collaborative, multi-scaled policy coupled with a reconceptualization of sacred space tourism is necessary.