CULTURAL COMMODIFICATION AND TOURISM IN THAILAND: A CASE STUDY OF ASIATIQUE THE RIVERFRONT

Abstract

Cultural tourism becomes the direction of tourism development in Thailand in recent years because more and more tourists look for cultural experience during their trip. It is believed that new form of cultural tourism focused on the integration of production and consumption; therefore, process of cultural commodification exists inevitably in tourism industry. This thesis attempts to study the pattern of cultural commodification, in contemporary Thailand, which target foreign tourists and local people. It also attempts to study and compare perceptions of local people and foreigners on the pattern of cultural commodification. Due to the limitation of resource and time, Asiatique the Riverfront, one of the famous tourist attractions of Bangkok is chosen to be the case study because it is accessible and well-integrated. Result shows that there are two sets of commodified culture aim at foreign tourists and local people respectively. Historical landscape architecture of Asiatique the Riverfront is commodified to attract the local people; while lifestyle of the local people is commodified to attract foreign tourists. Cultural commodification which targets foreign tourists are summarized as four patterns, including localization of foreign culture, borrowing of foreign culture, adaptation of local culture and cultural symbolization used on souvenir products. Although findings show that commodified culture is attractive to both foreign tourists and local people to different extend, it can be said that commodified culture is another factor drawing flow of people to tourist attractions.