“Tits Out for the Boys and No Back Chat”

Abstract

This article explores the dynamics between the structure of overarching gendered social relations and the practice of gendered identities in the cultural space of one particular tourist destination, Magaluf on the Mediterranean Island of Mallorca. Although there have been many studies concerning constructions of gendered identity in tourism, these have tended to examine sexual relations rather than everyday touristic practice. The data are drawn from several months of ethnographic fieldwork, which involved the production of maps of the resort. The position of the researcher is used in a reflexive analysis of the maps postfieldwork. The article demonstrates how the resort is encoded in the assignation of place names with an idealized type of masculinity that excludes women from the public sphere and furthermore how elements of touristic practice serve to reinforce ideas of women as sexual objects and belonging to the domestic sphere.