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7 Sun, Sand, and… Sacred Pyramids: The Mayanization of Cancun's Tourist Imaginary
Author(s) -
MuñozFernández Carmen
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
archeological papers of the american anthropological association
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.783
H-Index - 30
eISSN - 1551-8248
pISSN - 1551-823X
DOI - 10.1111/apaa.12048
Subject(s) - the imaginary , tourism , maya , promotion (chess) , commodity , iconography , cultural heritage , economy , geography , history , art , ancient history , archaeology , visual arts , political science , business , politics , economics , law , psychotherapist , psychology , finance
From its construction in the early 1970s, Cancun has gone through a rapid demographic change accompanied by a transformation in the tourism industry, from having 117 inhabitants in 1969 to over 734,000 in 2014, being visited by more than 3.3 million tourists per year. As a result, Cancun has had to offer up something other than its original Caribbean advertising of “sun, sand, and sex,” now it is offering its Maya heritage. This paper analyzes the origin, development, and evolution of the “Mayanization” of Cancun—the use of Maya imagery and iconography in advertisements, architecture and souvenirs—and the promotion of a “Maya imaginary” through the laborers who fuel the tourism industry, turning cultural, archaeological, and historical patrimony into a commodity.