Overview

More than a million tourists visit religious landmarks in San Antonio, Texas, each year, observing and sometimes participating in religious activities there. The San Antonio Missions National Historical Park - managed by the National Park Service, in cooperation with the Catholic Church - is one of hundreds of religious places in America and around the world where tourists have become a familiar presence. In Blessed with Tourists, Thomas S. Bremer explores the intersection of tourism and commerce with religion in America, using the missions and other San Antonio sites as prime examples. Bremer recounts the history of San Antonio, from its Native American roots to its development as a religious center with the growth of the Spanish colonial missions, to the modern transformation of San Antonio into a tourist destination. Employing both ethnographic and historical approaches, Bremer examines the concepts of place, identity, aesthetics, and commercialization, demonstrating numerous ways that modern market forces affect religious communities. By identifying important connections between religious and touristic practices, Bremer establishes San Antonio as a distinctive source for anyone seeking to understand the interplay between the religious and the secular, the traditional and the modern.

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9780807855805

Table of Contents

Reviews

Successful in examining a number of emerging themes in the study of religion and tourism, including the intersection between religion and capitalism, the production and consumption of religious sites by pilgrims and tourists, the process of resolution of contested interpretations of sacred sites, and secular interests in sacred sites. <br> a The Professional Geographer

Will be of interest to all students of American church history. -- Word and World

The book is well written and accessible to a large audience and addresses current issues in American cultural studies, such as race and class. . . . Scholars . . . will find this book impressive and helpful for thinking about the relationship between religion and tourism.-- Journal of American Folklore

Author Information

Thomas S. Bremer is assistant professor of religious studies at Rhodes College.

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