“Nós vamos invadir sua praia”: turismo, mudanças e aculturação em Pipa/RN

Abstract

The practice of tourism in destinations has great potential when planned and executed properly for the development of the place, considering not only the purchasing power that the practice provides, but also the environmental and cultural preservation and the aim of improving the quality of life for the native people. In theory, with the growth of tourism in the locality, it means more gains than losses, however there are a large number of tourist destinations that suffer from the tourist activity, with the increasing destruction of the territory, of the local culture, of the neglect of those who already lived there, among other implications. In these circumstances, this work will bring a perspective of the practice of the tourist activity as the main inducer of the negative cultural impacts, with a focus on acculturation, within a specific territory, Praia da Pipa, district of Tibau do Sul, Rio Grande do Norte (RN) as a case study. The methodology is applied through descriptive exploratory research, with a qualitative approach, through semi-structured interviews applied to residents of the community. Data obtained through documentary research, scientific articles, books, videos and photographs. The aim is to identify the phenomenon of tourism in Praia da Pipa with a more critical look at the culture, the loss of the local identity, the changes it has undergone with the practice of tourism, focusing on acculturation, verify the effects it has caused in the experience and coexistence of the native residents with a perspective of what it was and what it has become, the cultures, the rituals practiced there and left aside by the people themselves and understand the reason for this “normal” effect in the place where the practice of tourism opens, as the lyrics of the song by the band Ultraje a Rigor describe: “We are going to invade your beach”, for some feelings of invasion, for others a feeling of growth, this is what will be analyzed in this present article, as the famous popular saying goes, “two sides of the coin”