ABSTRACT
Can we assume that iconic architecture serves as a guide to national or local cultures? Advertisements for the Sinalei Reef Resort & Spa, for instance, typically mention not only its location in a “lush landscape” but also its fusion of “authentic” Samoan architecture. Reviewers on TripAdvisor comment on national character and culture, hospitality and friendliness of staff, activities, room fit-out and Wi-Fi connections – but very rarely mention authentic architecture. Does this lack of discussion mean a lack of awareness? Buildings are perhaps too familiar to warrant much discussion but that does not necessarily mean that “traditional” architecture’s iconicity is not effective. Sinalei resort, built to the wishes and concept of its Samoan owners, certainly plays to overseas tourists’ imaginaries, encouraging them to “escape to paradise”. Even if users of its authentic Samoan architecture may not consciously register its contribution to the “South Pacific Island Paradise” they enjoy, iconicity is still at work (Alexander et al., 2012). Iconicity, here, relies both on the “displacement of form” and “the persistence of the sense of belonging attached to it” (Refiti, 2015, p. 5). Tourist and local worlds, while occupying very different positions on various scales, overlap. Likewise, in Aotearoa, manaakitanga (hospitality) embodies reciprocal obligations of hosts and visitors, and protects and promotes cultural values-centred tourism development (Wikitera, 2006). Of course, Fia Fia nights and M?ori h?ng? shows are performed for tourists. Yet the performers will not only feel encouraged by their lay audience’s enthusiasm; they simultaneously perform for an appreciative and educated audience of fellow performers and local visitors. Equally, in the construction, maintenance and adornment of the iconic fale (houses) at the resort, there is a real somewhere close to the fake. We are not concerned here with virtuality as an illusionary, “sterile replica of the real”, but as potentiality – a dimension of reality eventuating “into ever new forms” (Massumi, 2014, p. 55). Even if decontextualized, the beauty of their iconic buildings asserts the value of Samoan and M?ori culture for resort staff. This chapter compares iconicity’s effects and affects at tourism sites in Samoa, Aotearoa, Germany and the United States to question and rethink built environments constructed for and by tourism.
