Performing tourism in Venice: local residents in focus

Abstract

In contrast to the growing literature on tourist mobility as a performed art, relatively little attention has been paid to resident mobility in tourism places. This paper examines how residents encounter tourists using the concept of tourism as a performance. Drawing on the case of the historic city-centre of Venice, in north-eastern Italy, it explores the spatialities produced through the embodied practices of local movements. The paper found that local residents’ movements demonstrated a marked degree of agency. It concludes by arguing that the concept of tourism as performance affords useful insights into how local residents are proactively and intricately involved in reconfiguring relationships and mobilities with and within tourism places.