Tourist Photographs as Souvenirs

Abstract

No matter what karl malden says in the American Express ads, it is a camera, not a charge card, that most tourists don't want to leave home without. The camera has become the definitive symbol of tourism (Figure 1). To be a tourist without taking pictures is somehow a violation of the rules; as Paul Fussell has noted, the only people who don't bring cameras on trips are those who are playing at being “antitourists,” ostentatiously flaunting their supposed freedom from being “mere” tourists.