In order to transmit a culture without altering it, while creating tourism, cultural and religious products, a variety of details must be taken into account regarding the basic tourism services such as accommodations and food. (gastronomy)These servicestourism, gastronomy, tradition, interculturality, advertising, tourism product

Babaita Carmen

Ispas Andreia

Istodor Daniela

English

Research Papers in Economics

23 
 
INTERCULTURALITY – A FACTOR OF TOURISM DEVELOPMENT - PART 1 - 
GASTRONOMY IN TOURISM, ATTRACTION OR IMPEDIMENT 
 
Babaita Carmen Mihaela 
University  of  the  West  Timisoara  Faculty  of  Economics  and  Business  Administration  Street 
J.H..Pestalozzi, nr. 16, 300115 Email: cbabaita@yahoo.com Tel: +04-0256-592-503 
Istodor Daniela 
University  of  the  West  Timisoara  Faculty  of  Economics  and  Business  Administration  Street 
J.H..Pestalozzi, nr. 16, 300115 Email: daniela.istodor@feaa.uvt.ro Tel: +04-0256-592-506 
Ispas Andreia 
University  of  the  West  Timisoara  Faculty  of  Economics  and  Business  Administration  Street 
J.H..Pestalozzi, nr. 16, 300115 Email: andreia.ispas@feaa.uvt.ro Tel: +04-0256-592-565 
 
In order to transmit a culture without altering it, while creating tourism, cultural and religious products, a 
variety of details must be taken into account regarding the basic tourism services such as accommodations 
and food. (gastronomy) 
These services, especially gastronomy, must be suited for the type of tourism.  This must be done because 
factors such as the environment are important in creating a great experience for the tourist.  
Keeping in mind the European Parliament’s suggestion to member states to improve tourism and perhaps 
develop new forms of tourism (such as rural tourism or gastronomic tourism), this study tries to identify 
what  are  the  best  environments  for  cultural  tourism  development  and  even  the  advertising  of  certain 
tourism packages at a national and international level. 
 
Keywords: tourism, gastronomy, tradition, interculturality, advertising, tourism product 
 
Cod JEL:L83, M10, M14, O18 
 
1. INTRODUCTION 
During the past few years, tourism and its economic effects have taken place in a large context of 
the globalized international economy. 
The benefits of globalization still remains a controversial issue, especially due to the fact that 
globalization  policies  are  examined  without  taking  into  consideration  the  interaction  of  key 
sectors of industry such as tourism. 
Interculturality however, becomes a new way of life in a dynamic globalized society that imposes 
the conservation of traditions and cultures in order to coordinate and implement respect towards 
cultural diversity.  An important function of interculturality is to determine cultures to coexist 
and to respect and appreciate each other. This favors the integration of people from various 
cultural backgrounds into other cultures and eliminates cultural barriers such as the gastronomica, 
religious, ethnic and linguistic barriers.  
Lately, the tourists experience with cultural difference grew (Pizam 1999; Reisinger and Turner 
2003; Robinson 1999; Ward, Bochner and Furnham 2001).  An interesting subject, as seen by 
social psychologists and geographers, is the process of learning that tourists undergo while in a 
tourism environment (Furnham 1984; Furnham and Bochner 1986; Hottola 1999; Pearce 1982). 
This study focuses on the emotional aspect of the intercultural experience of tourists with limited 
empirical evidence but with great potential for development. 
Intercultural studies should not be confused with anthropological studies regarding the guest-host 
relationship (Chambers 1997; Mason 1995; MacCannell 1992; Ross 1998; Smith 1989; Smith 
and Brent 2001; Yamashita, Kadir and Eades 1997), which generally focus more on the hosts’ 
experiences rather than the tourist’s adaptation to the new environment. 24 
 
The works of Graburn (1989, 2001) and others are interconnected through the ritual of transition 
and have an interesting potential for future studies regarding the adaptation of tourists. Nowadays 
a different aspect of intercultural tourism is studied. 
As  a  result  of the small number  of  studies  on tourists,  the  theoretical  discussions  about  the 
adaptation of tourists remain subordinated to studies regarding stays. A good example of this is 
the well known U-curve of cultural shock (Furnham 1984; Pearce 1982). Almost five decades 
have passed since Kalervo Oberg (1960) presented his hypothesis as an explanation of human 
intercultural adaptation, founded on a large palette of studies about stays in the 50s (Adler 1975; 
Bochner 1982; Furnham 1984; Smalley 1963). 
His work underlines the emotional curve that goes from depression to recovery, going through 
stages of euphoria, disillusion, hostility, adaptation and assimilation (fig. 1), with a number of 
names for each stage given by various authors (Pedersen 1995; Sue and Sue 1990). 
At first the tourist experiences the joy of arrival, followed later by dissapointment and hostility – 
at  the  point  when  he/she  encounters  reality  –  and,  in  the  end,  adaptation  and  assimilation. 
Adaptation and assimilation are the last signs which indicate that the person became part of the 
host culture. 
Today, the expression ”cultural shock” is often used in everyday language as an indicator of 
difficulties experienced by tourists while visiting other countries, activities that last for several 
weeks rather than years (Pearce 1998; Wearing 2001). 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Figure 1. U Curve 
 
The U Curve has been implemented as the dominant explanation of the tourism experience and 
cultural adaptation. 
The cultural information for international tourists available on the Internet, brochures, and travel 
guides introduce consumers of tourism to the concept of the U Curve. 
At the same time, academic literature regarding intercultural adaptation in tourism is based on 
cultural shock (Furnham 1984; Furnham and Bochner 1986; Graburn 1989, 2001; Hofstede 2001; 
Kaesbach 1997; Pearce 1982, 1998; Pedersen 1995; Reisinger and Turner 2003; Robinson 1999; 
van den Berghe 1994; Ward 2001; Westerhausen 2002). 
The problem with cultural shock is that it applies to all countries; such as countries that are part 
of the European Union and countries that will join. The theme of interculturality intersects with 
that of personal mobility and it applies to countries facing immigration issues as well as countries 
with emigration issues. 
It has been proven that the issue of interculturality applies not only to people who travel for work 
related purposes but also to those who travel for tourism reasons. 
Consequentially, The European Parliament invites the member states to improve their tourism 
image in order to stimulate the development of cultural tourism.  Also, member states are invited 
to take into consideration the emergence of new forms of tourism such as rural or gastronomic 
Euphoria 
Disillusionment 
Hostility 
Adaptation 
Assimilation 
Cultural 
shock 25 
 
tourism which are beneficial to the hospitality industry but also transmit cultural information 
regarding people and traditions. 
 
2. GASTRONOMY THROUGHOUT HISTORY  
We also must be aware of the fact that, over time, any culture loses some traits and gains others. 
This process is beneficial to the formation of a European culture and should be accepted. 
As  for  the  gastronomy  of  ancient  Europe,  our  knowledge  is  greater  when  we  take  into 
consideration the traditions of the ancient Greeks and Romans. 
As  it  is  already  well  known,  the  Greek  and  Roman  civilizations  were  the  most  developed 
civilizations, covering most of the continent with their influence. 
Food had great symbolism and played a role in rituals; in The Iliad and The Odyssey, there are 
numerous  references  to  the  gifts  that  the  Greeks  offered  the  gods,  as  per  their  polytheistic 
religion.  During the Hellenistic period, however, they started to focus on gastronomy (the fist 
cook book – Hedypathia, in free translation, to live voluptuously). Contact with the much more 
advanced  Greek  culture  and  the  expansion  of  the  Roman  Empire  fostered  links  between 
numerous cultures and the implementation of various influences in different forms. 
The discovery of America had a great impact on the European gastronomy. In just a few decades, 
a vast amount of new ingredients arrived in Europe and mixed with the already existing European 
ingredients.  European cooking as we know it today is, at its core, based on the historical event of 
the discovery of the new continent. 
It will be an era of great chefs, true celebrities; the apparition of restaurants in the form which 
lasted until the present day; of the writing of cook books by the greatest professionals and the 
structuring of the noble cooking – complicated, elegant and refined which made France famous 
and influenced the gastronomy of many other countries. 
For a long period of time, up until the first half of the 20th century, gastronomy was a concern of 
the  elite.  In  1972,  however,  there  was  a  great  change  in  cooking.  Rejecting  the  idea  of 
sophisticated, complicatedly cooked and pretentiously served meals, Nouvelle Cuisine starts a 
new era of fresh foods, cooked to be simple and to taste good. Also, Nouvelle Cuisine tried to 
maintain the initial flavor as well as the aesthetics of the meal which the way of preparation – 
elegant yet simple – had to stand out. 
The 20th century also gave us fusion cooking.  If, until then, a French meal was French meal and 
Japanese meal was a Japanese meal, typical of Japan and completely different from the French 
meal, fusion cooking allows and promises very tasty cultural transfers. Fusion cooking combines 
elements  of  several  culinary  traditions  without  identifying  itself  as  one  particular  tradition. 
Starting in the 1970s, many restaurants started proposing fusion menus based on real facts such 
as the cultural diversity of their customers, their passion and possibility to travel and the ever 
increasing complexity of preferences and the need for new experiences. 
Experts say that in over 100 years we will go beyond the system of the five basic tastes.  What if 
instead  of  searching  for  a  permanent  supply  of  food  in  a  supermarket,  in  standardization  a 
guarantee  of  quality  or  in  advertisements  the  truth  about  the  quality  of  food,  we  tried  to 
rediscover the link between food and its true sources and tried to judge its quality beyond the 
prefabricated mentality that is imposed on us? What if we relearned to value food as a gift of 
Earth, to think of it if not with the adoration with which the Aztecs worshiped corn, at least with 
the respect with which our grandparents honored bread and with the joy with which they marked 
every celebration with a feast? 
 
3. GASTRONOMY IN TOURISM – ATTRACTION OR IMPEDIMENT 
In the past few years, the study of gastronomy and culinary institutions has become a subdivision 
of sociological and anthropological research (Beardsworth and Keil 1996; Bell and Valentine 26 
 
1997;  Fine 1996;  Lupton 1996; MacClancy  1992; Mennell,  Murcott and  van  Otterloo  1992; 
Warde 1996; Warde and Martens 2000; Watson 1996). 
However,  while  the  relationship  between  tourism  and  the  different  cultural  aspects  of  the 
destinations – such as art, religion, sexuality – have been studied in detail by researchers of 
tourism.   
The interface  between food and tourism has been, until now, neglected by the promoters of 
tourism as well as the promoters of gastronomy. 
In advertising literature, the gastronomy of tourism destinations is heavily endorsed. Of course, 
the few publications of gastronomic tourism often consider it an important attraction 
There  are  too  few  studies  regarding  the  culinary  habits  of  tourists  or  of  the  processes  of 
transformation of local foods as they are influenced by tourists (Reynolds 1993). 
The unusual and familiarity are general categories of world wide interpretation (Schuetz 1944). 
These categories have great importance in tourism and have been reminded by Cohen (1972) in a 
formulation of the types of roles of tourists.  His main argument is that tourists travel in search of 
the unknown but need a certain amount of familiarity in order to be able to enjoy the experience. 
In gastronomical sociology, this sizing of familiarity and the unknown is the basis of Fischler’s 
distinction (1988) between “neophobic” and “neophilic” gastronomic tendencies. 
According to Fischler, the two tendencies reside in all individuals. People are considerably more 
skeptical and conservative when it comes to trying new foods. At the same time, however, they 
are attracted to new and unusual food. 
These two terms have roots in biology as well as cultural influences. There are considerable 
differences between cultures, thus influencing neophilic tendencies to a certain extent.   
Up until recently, the majority of Asian people have avoided new food. At the same time, people 
from the Western world have progressively embraced new food. In every culture, especially in 
the West, there are great differences between social classes and people. Thus, people can be 
classified by the predominance of neophilic or neophobic tendencies in gastronomy. 
Such a classification can be quite important for the study of culinary habits that people have on a 
day to day basis. 
It  could  also  be  considerably  significant  for  the  study  of  food  in  tourism  where  people  are 
exposed at a larger scale that of a day to day basis and to types of food that are unusual to them.  
Of course, the relatively strong neophobic tendencies that a tourist might experience against the 
neophilic  tendencies  can  be  implemented  in  the  construction  of  a  new  classification  of  the 
culinary sphere, parallel to Cohen’s general theory. 
However, the main characteristic of the culinary situation that tourists face is the fact that they 
exaggerate the tension between the neophilic and neophibic tendencies they experience. On one 
hand,  the  nourishment  implies  that  the  body  is  used  in  an  unfamiliar  environment  and  its 
ingestion amplifies the neophobic tendencies.  Thus, tourists become skeptical when it comes to 
consuming unusual food, the ingredients of which are unknown to them.  Such a meal can be a 
threat and implies a greater”survival risk” than other situations.  This situation occurs especially 
when tourists visit developing countries which are prejudicially believed to be misterious or 
dangerous.  In these cases, neophobia tends to be dominant. 
Few are those who can try unusual meals without being interested in its preparation or content 
prior  to  eating.    ”What  is  this?”  is  probably  the  first  question  tourists  ask  when  they  find 
themselves in front on an unknown dish.  Researchers observed that tourists who are otherwise 
adventurous become picky and skeptical when it comes to trying out new traditional meals 
On the other hand, there are always tourists who want to experience new things and are willing to 
take risks.  The trip stimulates their neophilic tendencies, motivating them to try new and unusual 
meals and drinks. 
However, even those willing to try new experiences can be skeptical of local cooking, especially 
in less developed countries. That is why, it is very important to analyze the local culinary culture 27 
 
and to examine the obstacles imposed by the tourists.  An example regarding the above statement 
would be a quote from a German tourist in Thailand:”I do not eat meat in Thailand; the people 
here touch the food with their hands.” 
One of the first things that tourists avoid when going to a foreign country is the consumption of 
local water. Many tourists are reluctant when they have to eat at local taverns even though they 
might seem welcoming. 
Such  mentalities  have  led  the  authors  of  the  book”The  Food  from  Taverns  in  Thailand”  to 
contradict  themselves  regarding  the  prejudicial  concept  that  food  from  taverns  is  generally 
unhygienic.  However, after it has been accepted that in and around where food is served in such 
places there is lack of hygiene,”the horrid image of chickens wandering freely near the place, that 
of  dirty  dishes  and  uncovered  condiment  containers,”  authors  ask  themselves”if  millions  of 
people consume this food on a daily basis and nothing happens to them, surely it is not that 
disastrous, from a medical point of view, for a tourist to try the food once or twice?”  (Yee and 
Gordon 1993). 
The tourists’ opinion regarding the safety of local food constitutes a great impediment in the 
development of new culinary experiences. Even when not under neophobical influences, tourists 
are skeptical when it comes to trying or eating local food and will most likely worry about their 
health or the disgust generated by the presumptive lack of hygiene of the food.  To add to this 
problem, there is also another impediment hosts may face, such as the rejection of the way the 
food is to be consumed. 
Even when they do not reject the local culinary traditions, tourists can be intimidated by the 
unfamiliarity of the host.   Perhaps the best example of the difficulties encountered by tourists 
resides in the usage of local eating utensils such as chop sticks, used especially in east and South 
East Asia. 
Differences between cultural categories and nature are even more obvious when raw ingredients 
are used. In some locations, the ”ingredient” is still alive at the arrival of the tourist to the 
restaurant. 
Although criticized, these practices are accepted in the Western civilization through the keeping 
of live crabs in the restaurant’s aquarium and the boiling of them in front of the customers.  
Seafood restaurants often display the fresh, raw seafood on ice. 
Although it is of considerable importance, the role and significance of food in tourism has been 
surprisingly scarcely discussed in sociological literature. 
In this chapter, we started from the tension between attraction and repulsion towards a new dish, 
analyzing the dilemmas encountered by tourists found in unfamiliar culinary situations. 
This chapter was based first and foremost on the variety of experimental  constraints in such 
situations. However, these aspects of local gastronomy, transformed and filtered to a certain 
extent, have managed to attract tourists. 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
1. ***Amendamentele Parlamentului European, 06.03.2007; 
2. Borca Anna, Jurnalul Na ional, 20.10.2007, Turism culinar în lume; 
3. Claudia A. Jurowski, 2007, Tourism and Intercultural Exchange; 
4. Erik Cohen, Nir Avieli, 2004, Food in Tourism, Attraction and Impediment; 
5. Guntur Sugiyarto, Adam Blake, M. Thea Sinclar, 2003, Tourism and Globalization; 
6. Horescu Marius, 24.05.2008, ziarul Agenda/pag.11, Turismul gastronomic – o altă modalitate 
de a cunoa te Europa; 
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2008/pag.12, Colaborare pentru brandul de turism al României;

21.10.2008, ziarul Averea, Turismul gastronomic ia cote astronomice;

24.05.2008, ziarul Agenda/pag.11, Turismul gastronomic – o altă modalitate de a cunoa te Europa;

29.01.2007, revista Target, Turism Gourmet;

editura PAIDEIA, Bucate, vinuri i obiceiuri române ti – edi ie revizuită;

Insitutul Na ional de Statistică – structura etnică Timi oara;

Jurnalul Na ional, 20.10.2007, Turism culinar în lume;

Ministerul pentru Întreprinderi Mici i Mijlocii, Comer , Turism i Profesii Liberale, Bucure ti 10.03.2008, Comunicat de presă;

Nir Avieli,

Tourism and Intercultural Exchange;

INTERCULTURALITY – A FACTOR OF TOURISM DEVELOPMENT (PART 1 - GASTRONOMY IN TOURISM, ATTRACTION OR IMPEDIMENT)

http://steconomice.uoradea.ro/anale/volume/2009/v2-economy-and-business-administration/02.pdf

INTERCULTURALITY – A FACTOR OF TOURISM DEVELOPMENT (PART 1 - GASTRONOMY IN TOURISM, ATTRACTION OR IMPEDIMENT)

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