Perpetuating tourism imaginaries: guidebooks and films on Lisbon Perpétuer les imaginaires touristiques: guides touristiques et films sur Lisbonne

Abstract

Though both guidebooks and films create fictions and dreamlands, the discursive intersections between them have not been a prioritised object of cultural analysis. The present paper aims at making a contribution to this field of investigation, looking into converging or shared mechanisms of cultural construction. Drawing on a recently concluded research project which focussed on tourist literature, the paper seeks to highlight and debate the way guidebook gazes significantly intertwine with filmic discourses on Portugal and its culture, contributing thus, in fact, to the perpetuation of a tourism imaginary in which the country apparently remains unchangeably locked.