CONSERVATION AND TOURISM DEVELOPMENT OF KENADSA HERITAGE IN THE SAHARA OF ALGERIA

Abstract

In the context of the economic crisis, Algeria develops, in recent decades, new strategies oriented towards the tourism sector in search of new areas of attractiveness. It contributes to the definition and staging of the tourist image of its vast territory, in particular its large part of the Sahara [1]. This fraction of the country full of wealth and values characterizes an apparent contrast between its great tourist possibilities and the weakness of their development: an unavoidable geographical part but unfortunately unappreciated and very little invested. In this perspective, this article proposes the redevelopment of the values of Kenadsa, an example of the Saharan city, by constitution an images of a tourist destination based on its promotional activities and visible landscapes. He determines to what extent the image communicated can contribute to the challenges of the attractiveness of the city and wonders how tourism will be able to register their sustainably to participate in the contemporary transformation of its heritage? The method used inspires by a contemporary approach to tourism development, mobilizing historical documents, speeches by individuals and committed architectural creations. And as the interventions on a historic building reveal as much the identity relation of the society with its history as that with the contemporary world, the methodology then combines the analysis of the speeches, as well as the analysis of the architecture and its representation.