Avoiding tourist traps: becoming an anti-racist traveler

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Whenever I travel, I intentionally avoid tourist traps. And I am not just talking about the tacky souvenir shops overflowing with snow globes and other plastic knick knacks with the bold “Made in China” label lazily plastered on the bottom.

Most of the items purchased in these exhibitionist stores will either be thrown away, gather dust on a shelf next to a family photo, or be packed up in a box for the holidays. (The only really worthwhile items to purchase at tourist traps are postcards –a category of the lost art of letter writing, or free art to nail above a bedroom mirror– or a magnet, which will lay on your fridge until the end of time.)

As I roam the cobblestone or concrete streets of a new city, I filter out inauthenticity or a strategic sales pitch – anything that aims at settling rose-colored glasses on the bridge of my freckled nose. Tour guides, brochures, or a shimmering paper weight that shove something beautiful in your face to distract you from the complex, dark, and haunting reality of an advertised “historical” city.

Travel is a privilege, just as access to diverse perspectives, storytelling, and historical sources is a privilege (although, thanks to social media, intersectional voices are more readily available within a simple swipe). It is an action of intentional displacement, of exploration. Travel is a choice; how, where, when, and what of the itinerary is also a choice. Specifically, how you travel matters.

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Consider this: does your travel confirm your social norms and assumptions, or do you actively seek to challenge them?

Temptation feeds our blissful ignorance; we dream of cozy vacations that confirm our social norms, biases, misinformed stereotypes, and perceived superiority or ethnocentrism. We accept any new perspective as the right one because it is shared by a local, and therefore, an expert. But do you ever hesitate, question, pause and reflect when, for example, a tour guide jubilantly boasts about a statue in the Savannah main square commemorating a Confederate Army officer? 

On a recent trip to the South for family vacation, I trekked through Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, Savannah, Georgia, and Florida.* Being a type A planner, I flipped through the guide books my parents brought and searched the internet for “Things to do in [fill in city name here].” My family and I prefer a balance of aimless roaming and structured activities, like a guided fly fishing trip or museum tour. And it is essential to enter this planning stage through cognizance and prioritization of diverse experiences. 

In a Condé Nast guide titled, “Questions Every Anti-Racist Traveler Should Ask on a Trip,” Alex Temblador enlightens readers on how to reframe travel planning and financial decisions through five steps. She describes how biases can lead to whitewashed, racist narratives: “unconscious bias can also appear in tour choices, such as taking U.S. plantation tours that are less about education and more about admiring the ‘big house.’”

Hilton Head, a predominantly white, middle-upper class beach resort town popular for spring breakers, is also home to the Gullah Geechee people. This community of descendants of enslaved West and Central Africans that established their own language, Gullah, and retained their cultural traditions during enslavement on plantations and after abolition. Freed Black Americans and Gullah people founded Mitchellville in 1862, a self-sufficient town and settlement on Hilton Head Island. Today, Gullah culture is celebrated, honored, and passed down through festivals and other community-run events. 
 
So, my family and I dedicated one day to visit the Coastal Discovery Museum to honor the history of the Gullah, understand their contributions to the island, and learn from their example of autonomy, cultural pride, and tradition. They offer Gullah heritage tours to Mitchellville in addition to free exhibits which offer insight into the lives, art, and traditions of the Gullah community across generations. Their store hosts paintings, prints, woven baskets, and other pieces from current local Gullah artists, including Sonja Griffin Evans.

Print by Sonja Griffin Evans

On a day trip to Savannah, Georgia –a rich, bustling city blossoming with stunning Greek revival and Victorian architecture, cobblestone streets, and square parks–my family and I temporarily separated. For the first portion of the day, we rode a trolley together to the City Market (and picked up some pralines, of course), Forsyth Park, and Leopold’s Ice Cream Parlor. 

I felt unsettled, to say the least, by the staggering number of colonial era statues or street names (e.g. “Plantation”) commemorating enslavers or Confederate soldiers. The guide brushed over these harmful memorializations of enslavement, displacement, violence, and racism to focus on another cultural icon: the bench from Forrest Gump. The famous scene in which Forrest preaches, “Mama always said life was like a box of chocolates; you never know whatcha gonna get” rang with a disturbing undertone in harmony with the trolley chime.

The travel industry carries a racist history and roots in colonialism, which prevails in the tourism industry’s common mission of selling the harmful caricature of exoticism. To avert this trap, work to recognize history’s modern implications in a given place by committing to restorative (and environmental) justice to BIPOC communities or uplifting local businesses. Also, listen to locals and Indigenous peoples; acknowledge when your visit would cause harm rather than uplift local communities.

In a Forbes article on an anti-racist global community of female travelers, Wanderlust, the founders –Beth Santos– relays a revealing reminder:

“‘From when people first started traveling, a lot of it was colonialism. . .That’s something we don’t talk about enough in travel. It’s not just the great things about connecting with other cultures and places, but there’s also an underlying history of a place and a real exploitation that’s happening even today, especially among Black, Indigenous and people of color.”

In Savannah, I signed up for a guided tour of the Owens-Thomas House & Slave Quarters. The largest city of Georgia in 1860, Savannah was occupied by “14,580 free inhabitants, including 705 free Blacks, and 7,712 enslaved African Americans.” Given the city’s deeply rooted history of enslavement and the cultural influence of enslaved Black Americans in Savannah, I sought to grasp an underlying piece of Savannah’s coined “historical” landscape.

Owens-Thomas house tour in Savannah, Georgia

The tour guide shared two perspectives from the period in which the house was occupied by the Owens and Thomas families: the enslavers and the enslaved. We toured the “slave quarters” (quarters of enslaved people) and listened to recounts of possible daily living experiences of the enslaved Black people living in the two cramped rooms. Approximately 600 enslaved Black people worked and lived in the house over its occupancy. These individuals are remembered through a wooden display of names – most likely given by their enslavers and not of West African origin – on planks of wood. Empty planks were reserved for an enslaved person whose name was not documented in records.

When touring the main house, we learned about the families’ roles in the slave trade and the relationships between the enslavers and enslaved Black people living in the house. Family separations and resistance of freed and enslaved Black Americans were briefly discussed; however, additional information was available through letter exchanges and artifacts for individual exploration at the end of the tour. 

This tour served as an enlightening conversation starter, taking baby steps towards reparations in a city built on slave labor.

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But traveling as an anti-racist and/or ally extends beyond seeking out diverse narratives and voices in a given city. Allyship cannot be switched on and off due to convenience or discomfort. Just like privilege, it is always on and is evidenced through our actions. To review, here are a handful of actionable steps you can take when planning your next trip/vacation:

1. Research whose land you will visit. Go to https://native-land.ca/ to identify the Indigenous nations, tribes, and territories of your destination. Explore the links to websites and resources to learn about the history of the land and the peoples indigenous to it.
2. Before you go, consider: does your travel confirm your social norms and assumptions, or do you actively seek to challenge them? 
3. Before you go on a service trip, consider: Does the nature of your trip reflect the intentions of voluntourism, Western imperialism, and/or a white savior complex (if you are white)? And if so, it’s best not to go; you are helping yourself out rather than the community you are “helping.”
4. Enter the planning stage with cognizance and prioritization of diverse experiences. 
5. Seek out locally and/or Native-owned businesses, shops, guided tours, etc. to both connect with culture and investigate the underlying history of the destination(s).
6. When traveling, be alert and aware of how implicit biases (others and your own) influence your experience and growing knowledge of the destination. Reflect on your personal biases and investigate any stories, “facts,” or information that build a misguided, racist interpretation of history.

I am still, and always will be, learning and unlearning. Please refer to the resources linked in this post for further research and source material. 

Listen, learn, and reflect. Remember, you write your own itinerary. Safe travels!
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*On the traditional lands and territories of the Mvskoke, Yamasee, and Guale Indigenous peoples.

Please correct any language or wording in the comments that reflects implicit bias or outdated terminology!

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Thanks for joining in the chaos!