Abstract
Based on an examination of the Christmas Evening Tour at Dundurn Castle, an historic home and national heritage site located in Hamilton, Ontario, this article investigates the living history format and the means through which it involves tourists’ physical senses and mental states. It considers the format’s dependence on performative exhibitionary practices that strive to convey an ‘authentic experience’ for tourists so that they might ‘live history’. In addition, analysis of the decorated atmosphere and tour content demonstrates that the Christmas tour represents an ethnicised version of a historical holiday – the Victorian Christmas celebration – and essentialises Canadian history as being distinctively British based. Finally, this paper examines the implications of this programme in relation to the existence of multiculturalism as state policy, which recognises the existence of many cultures in Canada.
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