Authenticity in social media: a post-postmodern tourism perspective
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.11606/issn.1984-4867.v35ip61-77Keywords:
Tourism, Authenticity, Social media, Tourism destination managementAbstract
In the digital age, the concept of authenticity in tourism has been fundamentally transformed by the pervasive influence of social media. This paper explores the evolving notion of authenticity through a post-postmodern lens. Its main goal is to highlight the importance of social media platforms in creating a post-postmodern perception of authenticity on travelers. The study highlights how Millennials prioritize “instagrammability” in their travel choices, seeking destinations that provide visually appealing and shareable content. Despite the rise of user-generated content and the democratization of information sharing, there is growing skepticism about the authenticity of social media images, which are often heavily edited. This theoretical essay adopts an exploratory and descriptive methodology, analyzing academic papers and nonacademic sources to understand the interplay between social media and authenticity in tourism. The findings suggest that tourists are increasingly valuing experiences and locations popularized by social media, sometimes over historically authentic sites. This shift underscores the need for Destination Management Organizations and businesses to adapt their marketing strategies to resonate with the contemporary, digitally-influenced perceptions of authenticity. By examining the constructs of authenticity and social media, the paper contextualizes authenticity within current societal and technological trends, proposing the concept of ‘alterreality’ as a framework for understanding tourists’ pursuit of fantasy in realistic settings. This study contributes to the ongoing discourse on authenticity in tourism, emphasizing the significant impact of social media on shaping tourists’ perceptions and experiences.
Downloads
References
Abdallah, L. K., & Ayouche, N. (2019). An “Instagrammable” life: Understaning the motives for consumption through Instagram Stories [Master’s thesis, Lund University]. Lund university libraries. https://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/search/publication/8984705
Agam, D. N. L. A. (2017). The Impact of Viral Marketing Through Instagram. Australasian Journal of Business, Social Science and Information Technology (AJBSSIT), 4(1), 40–45.
Arefieva, V.; Egger, R. & Yu, J. (2021). A machine learning approach to cluster destination image on Instagram. Tourism management, 85, 1-11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2021.104318
Arnold, A. (2018, January 24). Here’s how much Instagram likes influence Millennials choice for travel destinations. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewarnold/2018/01/24/heres- how-much-instagram-likes-influence-millennials-choice-of-travel- destinations/#3b134a894eba
Audrezet, A., de Kerviler, G., & Guidry Moulard, J. (2020). Authenticity under threat: When social media influencers need to go beyond self-presentation. Journal of Business Research, 117, 557–569. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2018.07.008
Ballina, F. J.; Valdes, L.; Del Valle, E. (2019). The Phygital experience in the smart tourism destination. International Journal of Tourism Cities, 5(4), 656–671. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJTC-11-2018-0088
Bauman, Z. (2007). Consuming Life. Polity Press.
Biadeni, B. S., & Castro, G. G. S. (2020). Studygrams: promovendo o consumo de modos de ser e estudar em plataformas digitais. Fronteiras - Estudos Midiáticos, 22(1), 72–83. https://doi.org/10.4013/fem.2020.221.07
Canavan, B., & McCamley, C. (2020). The passing of the postmodern in pop? Epochal consumption and marketing from Madonna, through Gaga, to Taylor. Journal of Business Research, 107, 222–230. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2018.12.005
Canavan, B., & McCamley, C. (2021). Negotiating authenticity: Three modernities. Annals of Tourism Research, 88. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2021.103185
Cantone, L., Cova, B., & Testa, P. (2020). Nostalgia and pastiche in the post-postmodern zeitgeist: The ‘postcar’ from Italy. Marketing Theory, 20(4), 481–500. https://doi.org/10.1177/1470593120942597
Çelik, S. (2017). The Usage of Instagram as a Marketing Tool. Journalism and Mass Communication, 7(3), 133–141. https://doi.org/10.17265/2160-6579/2017.03.002
Clement, J. (2020, October 26). Internet usage worldwide – statistics & facts. Statista. https://www.statista.com/topics/1145/internet-usage- worldwide/#:~:text=In%202019%2C%20the%20number%20of,currently%20connected%20t o%20the%20internet.
Cohen, E. (1988). Authenticity and commoditization in tourism. Annals of Tourism Research, 15, 371–386.
Due, B. L.; Toft, T. L. W. (2021). Phygital highlighting: Achieving joint visual attention when physically co-editing a digital text. Journal of Pragmatics, 177, 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2021.01.034
Durão, A. F., Santos, A. J. dos, Avelino, M. R., & Silveira, C. B. da M. (2017). Comiendo virtualmente con los ojos. Estudios y Perspectivas En Turismo, 26, 964–977.
Guerreiro, J. A., & Marques, J. F. (2017). Visita guiada à fábrica de antiguidades: sociologia, turismo e autenticidade. Revista Anais Brasileiros de Estudos Em Turismo, 7(1), 8–22. https://doi.org/10.34019/2238-2925.2017.v7.3160
Iglesias-Sánchez, P. P., Correia, M. B., Jambrino-Maldonado, C., & de las Heras-Pedrosa, C. (2020). Instagram as a co-creation space for tourist destination image-building: Algarve and costa del sol case studies. Sustainability, 12(7), 1–26. https://doi.org/10.3390/su12072793
Jansson, A. (2018). Rethinking post-tourism in the age of social media. Annals of Tourism Research, 69, 101–110. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2018.01.005
Kim, S., Leht, X., & Kandampully, J. (2019). The role of familiarity in consumer destination image formation. Tourism Review, 74(4), 885–901. https://doi.org/10.1108/TR-10-2018-0141
Köhler, A. F. (2021). Autenticidade: revisão de literatura e estado atual de sua discussão e aplicação no campo de turismo. Revista Iberoamericana de Turismo, 11(1), 60–84. https://doi.org/10.2436/20.8070.01.191
Krolow, P. J. (2019). Experiências instagramáveis nos brunches em Lisboa: busca por sabor ou likes? [Master’s dissertation, Portuguese Catholic University]. Veritati. https://repositorio.ucp.pt/handle/10400.14/30931
Leung, D., Law, R., Van Hoof, H., & Buhalis, D. (2013). Social Media in Tourism and Hospitality: A Literature Review. Journal of Travel and Tourism Marketing, 30(1–2), 3–22. https://doi.org/10.1080/10548408.2013.750919
Liu, H., Wu, L., & Li, X. (2019). Social Media Envy: How Experience Sharing on Social Networking Sites Drives Millennials’ Aspirational Tourism Consumption. Journal of Travel Research, 58(3), 355–369. https://doi.org/10.1177/0047287518761615
Lobo, T. (2023). Selfie and World: On instagrammable places and technologies for capturing them. Journal of human-technology relations, 1(1), 1-11. https://doi.org/10.59490/jhtr.2023.1.7011
MacCannell, D. (1973). Staged Authenticity: Arrangements of Social Space in Tourist Settings. American Journal of Sociology, 79(3), 589–603. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2776259
Manovich, L. (2017). Instagram and Contemporary Image. Qualcomm Institute http://manovich.net/index.php/projects/instagram-and-contemporary-image.
Matos, M. B. de A., & Barbosa, M. de L. de A. (2018). Autenticidade em Experiências de Turismo: proposição de um novo olhar baseado na Teoria da Complexidade de Edgar Morin. Revista Brasileira de Pesquisa Em Turismo, 12(3), 154–171. https://doi.org/10.7784/rbtur.v12i3.1457
Mohammadi, F., Yazdani, H. R., Jami Pour, M., & Soltani, M. (2020). Co-creation in tourism: a systematic mapping study. Tourism Review 76(2), 305–343. https://doi.org/10.1108/TR-10-2019-0425
Moretti, S. L. do A., Bertoli, B. J., & Zucco, F. D. (2016). A imagem de Blumenau no Instagram: um estudo sobre destino turístico em redes sociais usando equações estruturais. Caderno Virtual de Turismo, 16(1), 126–140. https://doi.org/10.18472/cvt.16n1.2016.1045
Palazzo, M., Vollero, A., Vitale, P., & Siano, A. (2021). Urban and rural destinations on Instagram: Exploring the influencers’ role in #sustainabletourism. Land Use Policy, 100. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2020.104915
Park, E., Choi, B. K., & Lee, T. J. (2019). The role and dimensions of authenticity in heritage tourism. Tourism Management, 74, 99–109. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2019.03.001
Perinotto, A. R. C. (2013). Investigando a comunicação turística de parnaíba/pi-brasil: internet e redes sociais, descrição e análise. Revista de Investigación en Turismo y Desarollo Local, 6(15), 1–25.
Petrosyan, A. (2023, September 13). Share of users worldwide accessing the internet in 1st quarter 2023, by device. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1289755/internet-access-by-device-worldwide/#:~:text=Global%20internet%20access%20Q1%202023%2C%20by%20device&text=As%20of%20the%20first%20quarter,almost%2063.4%20percent%20of%20respondents.
Rittichainuwat, B., Laws, E., Scott, N., & Rattanaphinanchai, S. (2018). Authenticity in Screen Tourism: Significance of Real and Substituted Screen Locations. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research, 42(8), 1274–1294. https://doi.org/10.1177/1096348017736568
Roser, M., Ritchie, H., & Ortiz-Ospina, E. (2019, June 27). Internet. Oxford Martin School. https://ourworldindata.org/internet
Ruby, D. (2023, August, 7). 78 Instagram statistics of 2023. Demand Sage. https://www.demandsage.com/instagram-statistics/#:~:text=There%20are%20currently%20over%202.35,users%20access%20Instagram%20every%20month.
Salazar, M. de M. (2017). Mundos-mosaicos: a estetização do cotidiano no Instagram [master’s dissertation, Federal University of Pernambuco]. Attena. https://repositorio.ufpe.br/handle/123456789/25182
Shepherd, R. J. (2015). Why Heidegger did not travel: Existential angst, authenticity, and tourist experiences. Annals of Tourism Research, 52, 60–71. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2015.02.018
Shin, S., & Xiang, Z. (2019). Social Media-Induced Tourism: A Conceptual Framework. E- Review of Tourism Research, 17(4), 581–591.
Skandalis, A., Byrom, J., & Banister, E. (2016). Paradox, tribalism, and the transitional consumption experience: In light of post-postmodernism. European Journal of Marketing, 50(7–8), 1308–1325. https://doi.org/10.1108/EJM-12-2014-0775
Smith, S. P. (2018). Instagram abroad: Performance, consumption and colonial narrative in tourism. Postcolonial Studies, 21(2), 172–191. https://doi.org/10.1080/13688790.2018.1461173
Smith, S. P. (2019). Landscapes for “likes”: capitalizing on travel with Instagram. Social Semiotics, 31(4), 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1080/10350330.2019.1664579
Steiner, C. J., & Reisinger, Y. (2006). Understanding existential authenticity. Annals of Tourism Research, 33(2), 299–318. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2005.08.002
Taylor, P. (2023, July 19) Number of smartphone mobile network subscriptions worldwide from 2016 to 2022, with forecasts from 2023 to 2028. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/330695/number-of-smartphone-users-worldwide/#:~:text=The%20number%20of%20smartphone%20mobile,of%20smartphone%20mobile%20network%20subscriptions.
Thomas, S., White, G. R. T., & Samuel, A. (2018). To pray and to play: Post-postmodern pilgrimage at Lourdes. Tourism Management, 68, 412–422. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2018.03.021
Tribe, J., & Mkono, M. (2017). Not such smart tourism? The concept of e-lienation. Annals of Tourism Research, 66, 105–115. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2017.07.001
Van Dijck, J., & Poell, T. (2013). Understanding social media logic. Media and Communication, 1(1), 2–14. https://doi.org/10.12924/mac2013.01010002
Volo, S., & Irimias, A. (2020). Instagram: Visual methods in tourism research. Annals of tourism research, 91(2), 1-4. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2020.103098.
Wang, N. (1999). Rethinking authenticity in tourism experience. Annals of Tourism Research, 26(2), 349–370.
Yu, J., & Egger, R. (2021). Color and Engagement in touristic Instagram pictures: a machine learning approach. Annals of Tourism Research, 89, 1-15. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2021.103204
Zucco, F. D., Pereira, M. de L., Limberger, P. F., & Falaster, C. D. (2018) Avaliação da imagem de um destino turístico no Instagram. Turismo Visão e Ação, 20(3), 490-499. https://doi.org/10.14210/rtva.v20n3.p490-499
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2024 Bruna Tavares de Almeida, Sérgio Rodrigues Leal
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Authors retain the copyright and grant the journal the right of first publication, with the work simultaneously licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0), allowing the sharing of the work with recognition of its authorship and initial publication in RTA.
