Description
This paper aims to investigate how the local and global are entangled in the production of the Rio de Janeiro as a tourist destination. Through an analysis of the archives of RioTur, Rio de Janeiro's official tourism enterprise, particularly its Strategic Planning (2017-2020) and the photo album “Rio Lifestyle”, available on the RioTur’s Flickr account, I noted the hyper-visibility of white bodies and of “Zona Sul” — the most affluent region of the city where most of the places sold as tourist attractions are located. The paper proposes the following argument: the image of Rio de Janeiro as a tourist city that circulates in the (inter)national is (re)produced by two abyssal lines: a geographical and a racial one. These lines constitute a violent regime which controls the movement of black bodies through the city and orients how these bodies can be presented in Rio. In this sense, I argue RioTur’s aim to present Rio as a modern city to the world is animated by a “imperial gaze” (FANON, 2008) that is manifested in a myriad of practices, including those of the tourist industry.
