Identità dei luoghi, monumenti e promozione turistica: Taormina tra Otto e Novecento

Already in the18th century, Taormina was the destination of wealthy travellers and scholars, and in the following century, for its enchanting landscape and splendid climate, it was defined as a “pleasure- ground”. After the first World War, due to the development of mass tourism, perception and appreciation of sites rapidly changed and a new typology of traveller was attracted by more folkloristic images of the sites. The paper intends to study these transformations in relation to the relevant changes in the figure of “tourist” and his way of perception and description of the site. In addition and strictly connected to the first aspect, the study is related to social and economic transformations of the place where, because of tourism, the way of presentation and description of the sites radically changed and monuments and landscapes become significantly less important from a cultural point of view but more useful in terms of economic interests.