ABSTRACT
This chapter is about identity-creation and a village population's responses to a period of accelerated socio-economic change. The people in the village of Deia on the island of Mallorca have lived side by side with increasing numbers of visitors and resident foreigners for more than a century. The manner in which the local people of Deia have reanimated their ‘traditional’ values and customs, and reinterpreted their identity in terms of the changing conditions of their lives, while gaining the advantages of participating in the modern world, can be useful to other afeas that are or will be experiencing similar ‘tourist development’. The foreigner describes the village from the distance: an outsider’s view of beauty and tranquillity, an idealised setting that satisfies personal needs, an economically viable alternative lifestyle, an investment, a ‘paradise’ offering a beautiful landscape, sun, drink, and many like-minded persons with whom to share these expatriate experiences.
