Tracing the materiality of reconciliation in tourism

Abstract

In this paper, we illuminate the material-discursive means by which tourism objects are imbricated with desire, are storied, and intervene in relations of reconciliation. Engaging an actor-network theory methodology informed by relational accountability, we trace the materiality of reconciliation through a multi-storied totem pole located within Algonquin Provincial Park, Ontario, Canada. By attending to these totem pole relations, we show how the agencies and materialities of tourism objects participate in awakening an ethics of reconciliation among Settler Canadians, and how engagements with tourism objects might enact a lively contemporary politics supportive of Indigenous resurgence. Informed by Indigenous and non-Indigenous relational methodologies and tourism literatures, we argue that tourism objects can work to disrupt colonizing narratives and realize reconciliatory desires in tourism.