Portuguese touripilgrims in the Portuguese insid way to Santiago de Compostela

Abstract

Our work focuses on the current de-differentiation between pilgrimage and tourism. If traditionally in tourism anthropology was defended the idea that tourism was a sacred ritual journey, a contemporary secular experience that aimed at a ritual of passage similar to that of religious pilgrimages, nowadays the opposite happens and tourism has become a model through which and without which the pilgrimages cannot be understood. Our reflection is based on an anthropological work begun in September 2015 on the tourism pilgrimages of the Portuguese Inside Way of Santiago de Compostela (Viseu - Vila Real - Chaves - Verín - Ourense - Santiago de Compostela) and the meanings that they present of their experience. This is an old pilgrimage route that has been revitalized recently. In our analysis we will discuss the porosity between tourism, pilgrimage and new secular spiritualties. We will also discuss throughout the text the motivations and senses of the tourism pilgrimage experience that respond to a mechanism of contemporary reflexivity.