Is Travel Journalism a Double-Edged Sword?

 Author: Z.B. Emad

In comparative literature courses the study of the construction of cultures is often an integral part, done vis-à-vis the analysis of the “travellers’ tales”. While this critical engagement is mostly done in regard to the colonial expansion and the European corpus of travel writing, the contemporary interconnectedness of different disciplines and fields has made it possible to extend it to other genres. With this understanding, in the ensuing essay, I discuss how the politics of the travellers’ tales can be found in parallel in the modern day field of travel journalism. I further explore how travel journalism has the potential to bypass the ideological restrains of its predecessor, hence the postulation that it operates as a double-edged sword. To illustrate this point in detail I discuss BBC’s Travel Show’s episode on Pakistan as a case study.

The travellers’ tales have been read and reread for their inherent politics of portraying other cultures in negative light. Edward Said’s Orientalism is a seminal work in this regard, for his research revealed that the orientalist discourse was generated because the exotic lands of the orient had become a “favorite place for Europeans to travel in and write about” (157) and this literature came to “articulate the East” (138). It is just to wonder what do the colonial politics of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries have anything in common with the contemporary global genre of travel journalism or how do these two disparate fields connect. Ben Cocking in his critical work on travel journalism traces this connection that the orientalist discourses came to inform the tourist industry of the later half of the 19th century which later translated to the modern day travel journalism.

Before we proceed any further, it is pertinent to understand what travel journalism constitutes. Ben Cocking explains the function of travel journalism as:

to construct the travel experience as a personalized, rather than mass, and unique, rather than homogenous, one. Frequently, this takes the form of enticing the tourist-consumer with opportunities to engage with aspects of the past, for example, the cultural, architectural or artistic heritage of a travel destination and in this sense can act as a conduit to older, travel writing (and often colonialist) discourses (86).

In conjunction he writes that travel journalism is often concerned with portraying “’others’” (Cocking 78). These definitions establish a clear parallel between the old travellers’ tales and the contemporary travel journalism; both these genres are focused on representing the ‘other’ and foreign cultures, while correspondingly, coming from a very personal and subjective viewpoint.

Another striking similarity that emerges between the two is that the travellers insisted that their accounts were authentic and faithful “simply because they have been there and we have not” (Bassnett 103). Likewise, travel journalists make similar claims on the grounds that their interaction with foreign cultures is on a personal level, thus it is separate from international politics and news reporting agendas. This, coupled with the fact that televised travel journalism provides the audience the chance to experience the foreign cultures and lands with the camera and the journalist, invoking a false sense of trust of what is being reported.

The BBC Travel Show serves an apt example of this and for the purpose of illustrating my point I have chosen the programme’s episode on Karachi, Pakistan, featuring the journalist Benjamin Zand. The interesting thing about this episode is that it opens with the intention of deconstructing the narratives of terrorism and political turmoil about the country, setting the pace of the show:

Pakistan is in the news almost constantly. The coverage of this area is pretty one-dimensional. If it is not focusing on the Taliban, it’s about the country’s differences with India or cricket. But there is a lot more to it then that. The country is home to over a 190 million people and 63% are under 25. Many of these are fun loving, forward-thinking individuals who are changing the world. So I am on my way to meet some (Zand 1:25-1:50).

This introduction sets the tone that the journalist is an open mined individual, who is aware of global politics, aiming to move beyond them, to meet the local people in their lived reality. From the beginning, the show gives the impression that it seeks to see Pakistan in a positive light, and compared to the mainstream journalism, this style of reporting would be more than welcome. It only adds to it, that throughout the tenminute segment, Benjamin Zand is seen on friendly and amicable terms with all locals in the camera frame, enjoying the local cuisine, culture and sports.

However, that being said, there are subtle points of contention in the representation that somehow seem to confirm to older biases. For instance, Zand’s visit to Lyari – “the most dangerous area of Karachi (Zand 5:16-17) – to play football is rather portrayed as a heroic act that a foreigner should, despite security issues, choose to interact with the locals who want to change it for the better. The point here is that, the narrative of violence remains in the backdrop, while it is being covered by the fact that the very locals wish for a change – not through politics or power but through sports.

The following sequences showcasing Zand playing a football match and having fun with the youth of Lyari are indeed clips that send a positive message to the global audience. However, Zand’s interchange with Mishal, the only female player, ends up reinforcing the many dialogues on female ostracization in the Pakistani patriarchal society. Mishal affirms to it that the “culture is extremely male-dominant and we don’t want females” (Zand 7:40-42). The criticism here is not to deny or downplay the struggles of women in Pakistan, but it is that even in a segment as short as of ten minutes, the show manages to bring in critical socio-cultural controversies that could otherwise have been left out. From this discussion, what we can conclude is that it is quite plausible to view travel journalism as an extension or at least as influenced by the travellers’ tales and their politics. Yet, keeping in mind that the times and genres have changed, there are positive aspects to travel journalism that we do not observe in our analysis of traveller’s tales from the colonial and pre-colonial times. Even if travel journalism is concerned with portraying the other to western audiences, it has to be given credit for improving the representation. In spite of this, critics like Cocking do maintain that travel journalism’s “underlying imperative is to encourage consumption”, which is why the positive images of the other, the “glimpses of somewhat unexpected or unconventional forms of representation must, at least at some level, also serve commercial purposes” (94). In this regard, it is perhaps best to take travel journalism with a grain of salt and view and read travel content with a critical eye.

Works Cited

Bassnett, Susan. Comparative Literature: A Critical Introduction. Blackwell, 1993.

Cocking, Ben. Travel Journalism and Travel Media: Identities, Places and Imaginings. Palgrave, 2020.

Said, Edward. Orientalism. 1978. Penguin, 2003.

Zand, Benjamin. “BBC Travel Show – Pakistan (Week 31).” YouTube, uploaded by BBC Travel Show, 12 August 2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwaA4GyOT8E