Tourist Consumption of Sacred Landscapes Space, Time and Vision

Abstract

This paper considers the way in which tourists consume a sacred landscape, utilizing the example of Uluru (Ayers Rock), a monolith at the heart of a World Heritage landscape in central Australia. Uluru is sacred to the Anangu Aboriginal people who have lived there for 30,000 years. It receives more than 350,000 visitors per year and is probably the most familiar landscape element in Australia, at least to non-Australians. Most Australians will never visit Uluru, yet it is still widely perceived as the geographical and social heart of the country located in the ‘Red Centre’ and symbolic of Australian-ness. For Europeans, whose familiarity with Australia may have come as a result of exposure to popular films or wildlife documentaries, a visit to Uluru may be a unique opportunity to encounter Aboriginal art, mythology and culture. Visitors consume the landscape of Uluru in a variety of different ways, some of which seem inappropriate to a sacred site. The most contentious of these is climbing the monolith itself, a procedure discouraged but not forbidden by its Anangu custodians. Temporary closure of the climb in 2001 as a result of the death of a tribal elder resulted in increased awareness of Uluru as a sacred landscape, a process already facilitated by Anangu-led tours. The visitor experience of Uluru is gradually refocusing from photography to participation, as the visitor is offered new ways of consuming the landscape.