Work-Leisure Relation and Attitude before the Contemporary Environmental Issues: challenges for the professional performance with ecotourism

Abstract

This article aims at discussing the performance of professionals that work with ecotourism in the surrounding area of Belo Horizonte and render services in four leisure activities: mountain biking, rock climbing, wildlife viewing and trekking. The investigation was impelled by the following questions: how the work-leisure relation is configured in these professionals’ performance? Which aspects are approached in their discourses and professional performance in relation to the environmental consciousness and environment degradation? The methodology of this qualitative investigation involved bibliographic and field research, in which the data were collected through participant observation and semistructured interviews with fifteen professionals. The results evidenced that the interviewed professionals approach nature-based activities due to family influence and, over the years, what was considered leisure turns into profession. Later, a better technical improvement is sought in order to obtain the professionalization in the area. The search for “risk” influences the preference of leisure experiences in natural environment and, in this aspect, nature comes second. Although they are also subject to criticism, the professionals that work with activities as wildlife viewing and trekking evidenced a greater sensibility regarding ecological questions and greater influence on the environmental education of the practitioners.