Fernando Barrios-martin

Tensions Amongst Collective Social Identities: the Island of Lanzarote: Understanding Cultural Complexity: an Analysis of Culture, Power and Identity Fernando Barrios-martin

In recent decades, the importance of 'Cultural Identities' and their subsequent effect on wider society has become a key area of research in many disciplines. Authors such as Erik Cohen, Jeremy Boissevain and Stuart Hall have lead discussions on how such 'Collective Identities' react to the internal and external forces with shape and influence them. Stuart Hall has argued that Tourism can have a significant impact upon the social identities of groups exposed to mass tourism. This can lead to the reassessment of values and interests, and indeed to a new awareness, resulting in feelings of self- consciousness amongst exposed groups. This is an in-depth study into the key tensions between the collective social identities in the case study of Lanzarote, placing particular focus on where such tensions are occurring. It is argued here that such studies are important in this field as they give valuable insight on how to protect the social identities of groups exposed to mass tourism, and to minimise the tensions that are often triggered by such changes.