How Do Destinations Frame Cultural Heritage? Content Analysis of Portugal's MunicipalWebsites

Abstract

In the current media context, heavily influenced by information and communication technologies, tourism destinations have a need to promote the most outstanding aspects of their cultures to attract the visitors who stimulate their economies. Websites are one of the tools available to carry out this task and they must be designed to communicate the destinations' heritages persuasively to a worldwide audience. Taking these premises into consideration, the objective of this research is to analyze the cultural heritage content on Portugal's municipal websites. The specific goals are to classify the most recurrent heritage elements and detect how they frame identity based on the 'local-global dialectic'. The results show that the heritage discourse is built on the selection of certain aspects-namely, culinary and architectural assets-which are emphasized through the combined use of local and national frames that strengthen the municipalities' particular values but also the fact that they are integrated into a broader and unified whole: Portugal.