What is the societal impact of the dominant narrative and language of tourism?

Studying how the urban space of Amsterdam changed immediately in the wake of the coronavirus travel restrictions, Ciara Waldron was instantly fascinated by the impact of tourism and travel on urban spaces today. This led her to research deeper terminologies used into the local and media reflection to the sudden pause of the previously exponential growth in the touristification of urban landscapes here and abroad.

Waldron proposes to decode this language, perhaps to make fun of it, to tear it down, so that it is seen as yet another form of top down governmental attempts to control the people in urban spaces. Exploring the tension-ridden relations created by binary terminology such as tourist/local, history/present, etc. she is proposing an alternative tour around the city of Amsterdam showcasing the complex and contradictory relations that take place in these tourist spaces, while highlighting the difficulties of subverting an industry which has managed to capitalise on irony and satire such as is the case in so much of the products of tourism.