Summary:
The present work reveals the results of a research project, where students from the Sociocultural Studies career at the University of Pinar del Río interact, from the development of their Diploma Work, linked to the sociocultural study of the tourist pole of Viñales. An essential problem of the hotel and non-hotel chains of Pinar Río lies in the low level of stay of tourists in its facilities, which is the result, among other things, of an insufficient socio-cultural offer that meets the levels of demand of the client who visits us.
Until now, there was no detailed study from a comprehensive diagnosis of the potential that Viñales from its sociocultural heritage can offer to design a cultural tourism product that harmoniously integrates all these potentials. The results of the case study carried out by the students in their research, led to the foundation of this methodological proposal to continue increasing this study from a University-Society relationship, based on the social commission of the graduate of Sociocultural studies and the object of their profession.
Introduction
When the recipes of globalizing models, of standardized development, of unique and elitist thought, causing damage to development, culture, the environment, increasingly local and community spaces, are imposed on the world, they are reaffirmed and accepted in management and self-management and sustainability as development that provides the necessary resources without damaging the environment and the future possibilities of man.
On the other hand, education and culture become increasingly important not only in relation to the production and socialization of knowledge, but also the development of human capacities and the formation of values.
The need for the development of a comprehensive general culture is a priority that emerges as an unavoidable imperative of the claims that contemporary society makes to the economic, political, and social evolution of each nation.
In the case of Cuba, the aspiration to achieve this local development is materialized in the enormous efforts that the defense of our social project implies.
But when it comes to development, it is no less true that Cuban economic policy directs most of its objectives to increase the potential of tourism, as an element for national and regional development, and in particular for the local development of communities in the tourist environment..
The extraordinary development achieved by tourism in the last decade, leads us to reflect on ways to modify this way of conceiving human activity.
Tourism is estimated based on its impact on investment needs, productivity, efficiency and effectiveness, all of which are indicators of the need to implement a sustainable development policy in each region.
It is therefore of vital importance that there is a sense of involvement of the local community in the development of tourism offerings, as a primary way of revealing the exponent of the cultural heritage that identifies the region.
There is no culture without tourism, just as there is no tourism without culture. This could become the motto to be followed by all those people who do not renounce the hope of living in a better world, and who assume with a transforming will, culture as an essential way of human improvement.
National and international tourism continues to be one of the most important for sociocultural exchange, offering a personal experience, not only about what survives the past, but also about current life and other societies. Tourism increasingly appreciated as a positive force for the conservation of nature and culture. Tourism can capture the economic aspects of heritage and take advantage of it to generate funds by educating the community and influencing its policy. It is an essential factor for many national and regional economies and can be an important development factor when properly managed.
By its very nature, tourism has become a complex phenomenon with biophysical, ecological, and aesthetic educational, cultural, social dimensions. Numerous opportunities and possibilities can be discovered by learning about the valuable interplay between the wishes of visitors and the aspirations and expectations of host or local communities.
Tourism development can become a driving agent for the preservation of cultural heritage, at the same time helping to raise awareness among residents of the area about its importance in this way the economic dimension becomes a stimulus for the preservation of heritage and artistic heritage of each geographical environment. Properly cultural values are not denatured or compromised by being linked to tourist interests, on the contrary, they contribute to signing conscience.
Heritage is a fundamental part of our culture, and an important element within the social development of the community. Sociocultural heritage can become the most attractive offer for tourism.
It is these ideas that have led to the reflection of the need to find alternatives that favor the implementation of community work methodologies, as a way of promoting, from the sociocultural heritage, the local development of communities in the tourist regions of Pinar del Río. However, there is proven evidence of little or no management to organically articulate a sociocultural offer in the design of the tourist product of Pinar del Río, which meets the expectations of the most demanding customer.
One of the reasons for this insufficiency is the deficit of a sociocultural study that allows full knowledge of all the potential of the tourist destination communities, due to the lack of specialized personnel, which would contribute to enhancing the possibilities of a sociocultural offer. sustainable development that these communities have.
The provincial delegation of tourism in Pinar del Río, has the possibility of articulating in the solution of this problem to the students of the career of Sociocultural Studies of the University of Pinar del Río, which from their social assignment and their modes of action can To give an adequate response to this need, however, the potential of their professional training process is not taken into account.
So the problem to be solved in this project is revealed as follows:
The students of Sociocultural Studies of the University of Pinar del Río, are not used efficiently from the potential of their professional training, for the research and promotion that the sociocultural heritage of the different tourist communities requires, associated with an insufficient relationship between University Society.
This work tries to make a study of the different factors that, from the interrelationships of the institutions of the locality, make possible the development of strategies of community sociocultural development, that reveal the potentialities that the research of these students possess, and that can be used by the different chains and tourist facilities, in the design of a product that meets the needs that current trends in tourism demand reveals.
Background and current status of the subject.
The topicality of the subject goes beyond the territorial and national framework. The development of a relationship between culture and tourism is marked on a global scale by the growth and changes foreseeable for this century, which influence the breakdown of traditional paradigms of tourism management, since the imprint of new tourist offerings does not they are alien to the preservation and development of cultural heritage.
If it is intended to develop a tourism of health, peace and tranquility, it is necessary to keep in mind what the different theories are, regarding the relationship of cultural heritage and tourism, from the same expression of interculturality, miscegenation, traditions, customs, myths, legends, musical wealth, linguistics, historical roots, idiosyncratic elements that identify the region, historical roots, artistic exponents as a way of insertion in the expectations of the tourist.
This social need becomes an urgent demand for our country, since cultural tourism, although it is seen as an economic process, is also a creative process, where tourists and population find themselves in this process of identity and creation.
The community has become a key scenario in the resistance strategy and, at the same time, in the development of the country in terms of guarantee and continuity of the Cuban social project as a concrete expression from within the broad spectrum of participatory and protagonist formulas. However, in the specific case of tourism, it is where fewer experiences and theoretical reflections are had regarding community participation and even less how it benefits from it.
That is why within the expectations of this project the leading role of the local community is conceived, its participation in decision-making and profits from profits, which is a guarantee for the identity and sense of belonging to the project.
objective
Implement a community work methodology that enhances the sociocultural heritage based on the tourist development of the Pinar del Río regions from the research work of the students of the Sociocultural Studies Career at the University of Pinar del Río, based on:
- Diagnosis of the potential of the cultural heritage that each tourist region has since its report on labor practice, as well as its investigative work. Training for managers of the different institutions in the region and the community regarding participation, Ministry of Culture, MINTUR, MINED CDR; FMC, Popular Council). Articulation of institutions to the tourist product from the design of sociocultural animation programs. Validate the methodology designed in the territory of Viñales (case study).
The results achieved are the following:
1- Comprehensive diagnosis of the potential of the province from its sociocultural heritage to put it in function of a superior development of the tourist regions from a theoretical foundation provided by the research carried out by the students.
2- Training for all the actors of the institutions that intervene in the actions of the community and the tourist region in the empowerment of their socio-cultural heritage, from the design of community participation workshops.
3- Community work methodology in the empowerment of its socio-cultural heritage, for the improvement of its tourist heritage in the province of Pinar del Río.
4- Development of sociocultural animation programs for tourist facilities in Viñales, in Pinar del Río.
The tourist culture and the peculiarities of community tourism is a dynamic process, but above all a creative one, where tourists and residents find themselves, in this process of identity and creativity.
Community and project are two terms that have been present in Cuba since the 90s, the community has become a key scenario in the resistance strategy and at the same time the guarantee and continuity of the Cuban social project, as a concrete expression within the broad spectrum of participatory formulas.
In the case of tourism, it is where fewer experiences and theoretical reflections exist, regarding their participation in the community, and even less as a beneficiary of it.
Within the expectations of this work, the role of the local community is conceived, its participation with decision-making power and the benefit of profits, which is a guarantee of the identity and sense of belonging to the project and its responsibility in it, seen this as instrumental links between specialists of the transformative proposals and changes that occur in the community.
For this, it is essential to include some learnings that have been leaving some experiences in other projects such as the Eusebio Leal Project in Old Havana, Las Terrazas Tourist Complex, Baconao Park, etc.
Community participation and action as a process focused on people - local population - tourists, requires that the former play a leading role in the transformation - conservation of their local environment, based on their knowledge, identity and values.
Culture and local identity are essential factors in the approach a community takes towards its development. That is why the levels of articulation and organization of the social body, the degree of attachment to traditions, the ease and difficulty for social coexistence, the acceptance or rejection of new projects or proposals are developed in the community, the evolution of the codes and ethical values that these can generate, people as reactive elements that slow down or enhance community actions and the projects they carry out.
The dimension of the sociocultural promoter in this proposal, based on an organic version of the tourist and community culture, can successfully interact with the different social actors involved, including first of all the tourists and the local population itself, in addition to the institutions of the tourism, local government actors, cultural institutions of the territory, in particular that of local history and culture.
Methodology to enhance the socio-cultural heritage of the community, for the improvement of the tourist product.
The methodology that is applied in the proposal implements different actions, cognitive educational and ethical that enhance from the sociocultural heritage and nature tourism in Pinar del Río, with the involvement and leading role of the local population. This has an implication on how to implement different actions in the community linked to tourism, in an orderly, systematic and coherent way, to articulate the objectives to be achieved and the methodological principles in relation to the tourism product.
The methodology guides the actions of the project in order to focus the potential of the community, its environment and the articulation to all social actors.
The methodology is based on dialogue communication, on the participation of subjects in the production of knowledge, together with specialists in the transformation of reality, and serves as a tool in a process that contributes to strengthening, raising awareness and empowering communities and their resources around tourism.
The methodological assumptions of this proposal conceive research teams and interdisciplinary, interrelational and multipurpose works, which provide a broad basis for collective commitment and greater strength of cooperation, comprehensiveness and scientific rigor, as well as a plural and democratic exchange of knowledge.
In our case, external factors favor the start of the project based on the guiding ideas, not to intervene and extend in the sense of supplanting culture and local values, but to facilitate and collaborate. Given the case at hand, the tourist, cultural and government institutions of the territory are present, which includes the real participation of the population from the conception of the project to its execution and evaluation of the results (impacts).
The external agents will be the students of sociocultural studies, who from their investigative work practice, even when they are experts, join the group as members of these, but without supplanting the community and without privileges in this regard, although they have specific functions that identify them., such as training, directing, organizing and promoting human and natural resources for tourism.
In general, there is a rapprochement between local residents and professionals with tourists, involving all actors.
The initial protagonist of the external agent, committed to the community and its destinies, must progressively move to the leading role of the resident community.
This methodology is used with a group of relevant theoretical and methodological principles that make it viable, namely:
Participatory community diagnosis.
Education and training of human capital.
Rational and sustainable use of physical resources.
Integrality and community participation.
Linking the external agent (student) with the internal actors of the community.
Community systematization.
The tourist work in the communities, given the dynamics, diversity, complexity and changes, requires a methodology that is essentially dialectical, not rigid, not schematic, given how contradictory and diverse its operation is, based on the principle that a working methodology it does not operate identically in different contexts. The proposed methodology to operate executing the present project is not a scheme, which is applied uniformly to any community with tourist purposes, but rather requires organic interaction between the thinking and feeling of the local community and its physical, natural, cultural and Social.
Conclusions
The work presented is part of a territorial project of local development approved by the Institute of Science, Technology and Environment in which various institutions converge, but with the interest of meeting the same objective, promoting an improvement in the quality of life of the inhabitants of the communities, where the student of Sociocultural studies is perfectly inserted for providing from their professional training process the potentialities and essential requirements for the performance of a comprehensive study of the communities, thus complying with Law No. 1 of didactic science, the University-Society relationship.
The methodology to perfect the design of a tourist product from the potential of the sociocultural heritage of the communities is totally feasible, since there are human and material resources to achieve such an endeavor, when designing the investigative work practice of the students of Sociocultural Studies in Function of the fulfillment of his social order in one of the spheres of action revealed in the professional model, which is tourism.
It is unquestionable that among the contemporary trends in tourism, that of a socio-cultural nature stands out, since today's society is torn between the need to achieve greater knowledge, and satisfy the spiritual needs of man, therefore one of the demands placed on him. to the current university, is to train professionals who from their level of competence can perform in accordance with their social mandate.
The possibility of perfecting the tourism product from the potential of the community's socio-cultural heritage, positively affects the level of stay of the tourist in the facility, and encourages community intervention in the process of preserving their culture, identity and sense of belonging. To the region, for this reason, it is considered feasible to improve the curricular design of the Sociocultural Studies Career, in its investigative work component, for the contributions that in the design of the integral tourist product of the Pinar Río province, they can offer from your academic reference.
Entities that make up the project.
Pinar del Río Hotel and Tourism School.
Responsible for directing the project towards the development of tasks and the development of instruments for the diagnosis and development of human resources, development of the application methodology in the communities.
Application of the methodology in the case studies.
University of Pinar del Río.
It will make the research work viable from the Management Study Center.
Provincial Delegation of Culture.
It will be in charge of developing all the actions related to community intervention from the different cultural manifestations revealed by the diagnosis.
Union of Historians of Cuba will provide the historical references that are needed and that are needed and that are the results of the investigations of the teams of the municipal commission of local history.
Tourist facilities of the Viñales municipality selected for the case study.
Research methods to use.
Logical history. For the foundation of the historical-cultural traditions of each region, or that will allow the study of the origin, evolution and development of the cultural heritage of the communities of the different tourist regions of Pinar del Río.
Investigation action. To develop the methodology of community intervention from the different cultural manifestations of the heritage revealed by the community.
Empirical methods.
The application of surveys, interviews, group analysis and observation of activities carried out by the community.
Documentary analysis. Study of the policy of the Ministry of Culture and MINTUR, regarding the development of joint tourism development strategies.
Study of the legislation on cultural heritage.
Statistical methods.
To validate through expert criteria the results and effectiveness of the proposed methodology.
