Negative Cultural Impacts Due To Tourism Development-A Comparative Study between Urban and Rural Tourist Centres of Kerala

Kerala globally known as God‘s Own ountry by reason of an advertisement campaign initiated by Kerala Tourism Development Corporation is a world famous tourist centre. Its culture, traditions, festivals and modern society are unique and internationally known. Its rich forests, healthy rivers and beautiful landscapes are natural marvels of the world. Kerala is famous especially for its eco-tourism and responsible tourism initiatives. Tourism industry is the backbone of the state‘s economy by contributing a sizeable portion of its GDP. Tourism development and host culture are strongly related. Tourism interfere the cultural originality in multiple ways. To a certain extent it strengthens the host culture but at the same time it distracts the virginity of the culture also. How urban and rural tourist centres of Kerala are affected by the negative cultural impacts is the subject matter of this study.

Tourism has a multiple impact on the culture of the locality. It influences culture of the region positively and negatively. Tourism experiences prove that it is powerful enough to make a cultural transition. It may be drifted positively or negatively according to the circumstances prevailing in the locality. The study tries to bring out specifically the negative cultural impacts of tourism. Cultural commoditization, standardization, cultural clashes etc. are some of the negative impacts. Kerala is a place of rich culture and ancient traditions and its monuments are internationally renowned. Tourist interventions may disturb the culture adversely and the study tries to bring out how these negative cultural impacts vary with urban and rural centres of Kerala. That means cross cultural interaction can make significant changes in the cultural lifestyle of host population. The level and intensity of this issue changes with respect to the tourist centre‘s geographical location. Hence the study makes a comparison between a sample of tourist centres selected in urban and rural Kerala. The problem is stated as ‗NEGATIVE CULTURAL IMPACTS DUE TO TOURISM DEVELOPMENT-A COMPARATIVE STUDY BETWEEN URBAN AND RURAL TOURIST CENTRES OF KERALA‘.

The paper has the following objectives; 1. To identify the negative cultural impacts in Kerala due to tourism development. 2. To know whether urban or rural centres are worst affected in terms of the identified negative cultural impacts. 3. To make suggestions to reduce negative cultural impacts

DESIGN

Both primary and secondary data are used in the study. A sample of 151 respondents belonging to urban centres and 249 of rural centres are selected by Simple Random Sampling Method Publications, Magazines, News Papers, Journals, Reference Books, Library Materials and the internet.

The development of tourism invites a lot of distractions to the culture of a region. Those distractions are called negative cultural impacts. The following are the major cultural negatives identified for the study;

The originality of the culture is degraded by the interference of tourists. Hence the culture of the locality will lose its original values to get a new mixed form. The continuous arrival and interaction of tourists will slowly degrade its true nature.

For higher tourism revenues and to attract more tourists the authorities sell culture as a commodity. That means culture is traded like products or commodities for tourist satisfaction. It eventually reduces the importance of culture of the region.

Tourists are coming to visit a centre from different parts of the world. They do not know the importance of the culture of a locality which is considered divine by the host community. The tourists because of their ignorance disrespect the local culture, traditions and monuments.

Cross cultural interaction of tourist culture with host culture deteriorates the importance and authenticity of the host culture.

The culture of the locality is standardized for the sake of tourist satisfaction. That means it is made attractive by modification to suit the demands of the tourists just like packages.

Disrespect of culture by tourists often leads to cultural clashes. The tourist culture and the host culture might be contrary to one another leading to a cultural clash. from four hundred respondents comprising 151 from urban centres and 249 from rural centres of different parts of Kerala are compared by using descriptive statistics including Arithmetic Mean and Standard Deviation. Finally the significant difference of the variations is tested by using ANOVA. The analysis is done by using SPSS Software.

From the above table it is observed that in all the six negative cultural impacts the urban centres are leading with Mean Scores 28.9073 for Cultural Degradation, 19.1391 for Cultural Commoditisation, 20.6159 for Cultural Disrespect, 24.8675 for Loss of Authenticity, 18.6424 for Standardisation and 17.9603 for Cultural Clashes. That means in the opinion of the respondents selected for the study all the six negatives are more popular with respect to urban tourist centres than with rural.

of ANOVA. The following hypotheses are used to test the variation;

H1: There is significant difference between the Mean Scores of urban and rural tourist centres with reference to negative cultural impacts From the above table it is visible that all the six variables under study are varying significantly between the urban and rural places of tourist centres. The variations are found to be significant at 1% Level of Significance in all cases as p<0.01 (vide last column of the table). Hence, the null hypotheses are rejected and the alternate hypotheses are accepted at 1% level meaning there is significant difference between the Mean Scores of urban and rural tourist centres of Kerala with respect to negative cultural impacts.

1. In the case of the first negative cultural impact, Cultural Degradation the urban centres are leading with a Mean Score of 28.9073 indicating the issue is more popular in urban areas than in rural 2. Considering the second variable Cultural Commoditization also the urban area is leading with a Mean Score of 19.1391 representing the problem is more prevalent in urban centres.

4. Loss of Authenticity being the fourth variable is also considered as a more prominent issue in urban centres as its Average Score is 24.8675 higher than that of rural centres.

6. The sixth indicator of negative cultural impacts called Cultural Clashes is also prevalent in urban than in rural centres of Kerala as its Mean Score 17.9603 is higher than that of rural. From the above discussions of the paper the following suggestions are evolved; 1. Cultural tourism should be identified as a separate area by authorities and should be given special consideration so that the tourists will not disrespect the culture of the centres. 2. An education drive should be undertaken both for host community as well as for the guest community so that both uphold the dignity of cultural sites. 3. From the study it is seen that urban centres are worst affected by cultural negative impacts. Hence urgent steps should be undertaken to revive the cultural traditions of such centres by campaigning and media advertising.

Kerala‘s cultural traditions are unique compared to other states of India. Its monuments and cultural sites and temples are world famous. At the same time it is one among the world famous tourist spots also. As per the report of the National Geographic Traveler Magazine Kerala is one among the ten paradises on the world. The scale of tourist arrivals to the state is alarmingly high. Tourism industry is a major revenue earner to the state contributing significantly to its GDP. The government has to deal tourism development with utmost care as there is a high potential to destroy the virginity of the culture of the state due to tourist interference.

1. Vijay Kumar Gupta, 1987, Tourism in India, Gyan Publishing House 2. E-book of Ministry of Tourism, 2015 3. A K Bhatia, 2012, Tourism Development, Principles and Practices, Jain Book Agency, New Delhi 4. Manaohar Puri, 2006, Tourism Management, Jain Book Agency, New Delhi 5. http://www.kerenvis.nic.in/isbeid/w_ disposal.htm, ENVIS Centre Kerala 2009, Kerala State Council for Science, Technology and Environment, Thiruvananthapuram. Business Management. 7. Colleen Ward & Tracy Berno, 2011, Beyond Social Exchange Theory-Attitudes Towards Tourists, Annals of Tourist Research, Great Britain.

Associate Professor of Commerce, SAS SNDP Yogam College, Konni, Pathanamthitta, Kerala psajithps@gmail.com