University of Heidelberg

Presentation

"Colonial Gaze and Tourist Guide. The Making of the Archaeological Park of Angkor in the French Protectorate of Cambodia" 

In 1907, the Franco-Siamese treaty brought the north-western provinces of Cambodia into the French protectorate and, as a consequence, the temples of Angkor were not only foreseen to become an archaeological icon of the French-colonial mission civilisatrice, but also a major pleasure destination for the fast growing transcontinental tourist industry. In this latter project, and for the case of Angkor, three points of observation will are discussed: first, the forced vulgarization of the Angkor temples through detailed travel guides was primarily lead by the French chief conservators of Angkor themselves and these guide books dominated the tourist industry of the Angkor heritage until the Cambodian independence in 1953 and beyond. Second, it is an often discussed fact that imperialistic World and Colonial Exhibitions of the second half of the 19th and first half of the 20th century in Europe displayed colonialized and therefore appropriated heritage from overseas colonies in a supposedly scientific and strict visual order: as a symbol of dominating power and cultural hegemony. The visitors should get a carefully pre-selected and well organized notion of the colonialized countries (a kind of “orientalistic mental map”), their people and heritage before they might eventually venture out to visit these places in their original setting. Quite astonishingly, similar ordering features for the space, the visitor’s movement, the time budget, visual perspectives and the classified and hierarchized heritage material can be detected in early guide books on Angkor. Almost all French travel literature on Angkor was in some degree initiated, published and financed by institutions, committees and societies that had a clear ideological interest in a proper presentation of this “marvel” of French-colonial patrimoine. Third: As we focus on Angkor guides from 1900 until the late 1950s, we can determine major steps of their development from an early phase of undefined conventions, of vulgarisation to a late standardization of archaeological heritage display in situ. To sum this last point up: the area of the Angkor temples was aesthetically and also physically converted from a lightly-populated, but nevertheless lively place of local worship into a dead archaeological heritage park of early globalized tourism.

Information about the Angkor Workshop can be obtained here.