TOURISM IN ALTER DO CHÃO, SANTARÉM-PA: BETWEEN POPULAR CULTURE AND MASS CULTURE

Abstract

In the district of Alter-do-Chão, Santarém-Pará, there is an intense movement in this space through tourism and because of this, the municipal government has developed actions to increase the demand of tourists. Thus, the main initiatives of the public authorities have been for socio-cultural segments that reach mass tourism and give up investments in the most diverse possible segments, as well as in cultural diversity, maintaining and launching on the margins of the dissemination cultural expressions of traditional and original human groups. The research reflects on the visibility of Alter-do-Chão to understand its daily dynamism supported by secular and economic cultural practices, with emphasis on the role of tourist activity and its positive and negative impacts. This situation is explicit when comparing the emphasis given to Çairé, which is a cultural manifestation known even outside Brazil, and which receives a large capital contribution from the municipal government, while the Borari Festival, a celebration that maintains the deepest roots of the origins and representation of the sociocultural formation of the residents. Thus, one of the strong consequences of tourism is the change in the traditional way of life, as the residents saw their spatial relationship modified without their consent when the Çairé was "chosen" as the focus of strengthening and disseminating tourism – in this way, a relationship with the rivers, but above all with the Tapajós, a source of food, transport and life relations,  were modified, also resulting in agricultural food production affecting mainly family agriculture for the subsistence of thousands of families.