Slow Tourism in the Sustainability of Local Culture

Introduction

Local culture expresses the essence of societies and all their values from the past. Carrying the traces of the past into the future and ensuring the continuity of local cultures has become a very important issue today. Local cultures create their specific regions around the world to reflect the identity of the group to which they belong. Local culture reflects all their experiences from the past to the present, which affects the lifestyle of local people. The disappearance of local culture under the effect of globalization reduces local differentiation in the world. However, local distinction is one of the main attraction of tourism. Also tourism is the key point of intercultural communication. Recognition of different cultures, intercultural transfer and interaction are the main goals of tourism. People set trips to get to know and experience the local culture in different regions. Local culture encompasses everything local communities have, from tangible and intangible heritage elements to the natural environment. All these also constitute the sources of tourism supply. Many alternative types of tourism, especially cultural tourism, focus on experiencing authentic experiences. Individuals who want to escape crowded cities tend to prefer destinations where calm is greater and locality is maintained. For this reason, the preservation of local culture is also very important for tourism.

The sustainability of tourism resources has become one of the main problems of today. Being sustainable in the world is one of the most important criteria for buying or traveling, while in tourism, this is reflected. Many issues, such as the sustainability of destinations, sources of supply, and tourist attractions, are on the agenda of tourism researchers. As solutions and ideas arise on these issues, sustainability philosophies adopted in different areas are reflected in tourism and adopted in this area. One of these sustainability philosophies, which is reflected in tourism, is the slow tourism movement.

The slow movement began with the slow food movement in order to ensure the sustainability of eating habits and to respond to the issue of fast food. The Slow Food philosophy of time then the slow-motion slow city (CittaSlow), slow living, slow trade, slow money, slow art, slow design, slow like reading the lower branches spread (Markwell, Fullagar and Wilson, 2012: 228). Its slow movement is a movement that emphasizes the need to devote more time to achieving results rather than aiming to slow people's pace and actions. In this movement, the purpose is to ensure that time is lived to the fullest, that everything consumed is sustainable, and that everything original remains original and is passed on to future generations (Jang and Jung, 2015). After the philosophy that emerged in the form of the slow movement, it also became widely used in tourism and was a very important factor, especially for the sustainability of destinations. The preservation and sustainability of the local culture, which is very important for the sustainability of tourism, is supported by this philosophy. As a reflection of this, slow tourism has emerged as an alternative type of tourism. The essence of slow tourism is local sustainability. Slow tourism covers tourism activities by visiting slow cities, tasting slow food, and enjoying the moment by moving away from the anxiety of uploading photos to social media accounts while experiencing all this. Like all other formations that adopt the slow philosophy, slow tourism emphasizes the need to stay in the moment and enjoy travel, overcoming the anxiety of time. The slow tourism movement, on which sustainability is based, is supported by practices such as slow city and slow food. Slow food is based on the sustainability of local flavors. As with the slow food movement, slow cities focus on good food, healthy environments, sustainable economies, preserving local and traditional culture, and argue that life should be spent comfortably, slowly, enjoyable, and enjoyed (Yilmaz and Çokal, 2019). Slow food and slow city philosophies constitute the supply sources of slow tourism.

Slow tourism has six sub-dimensions: interaction, authenticity, sustainability, slowness, time, and emotion, which are also associated with these experiences. In order for a tourism activity to be considered as slow tourism, it should cover these six dimensions (Dall’Aglio, 2011).These dimensions of slow tourism represent the quality of the time spent in the destination rather than the quantity, which is the essence of the slow tourism movement.