The tourist moment

Recognizing the gap between experience and the representation of it, this essay explores the interpellation of the tourist-as-subject in a serendipitous moment-the tourist moment-as represented in narrative. Because it conditions a spontaneous instance of self-discovery and belonging, the moment simultaneously produces and erases the tourist-as-subject, for at the very instant of awareness and self-representation as tourist, one goes beyond being a tourist. This double movement of constitution and dissolution represents a temporary end to the search for authenticity, for the tourist perceives himself to have gotten beyond both touristic representation and subjectivity. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.