Local masculinities beyond images: youth, fatherhood, and tourism in the South Caribbean of Costa Rica
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Abstract
The main objective of this thesis is to gain a better understanding of how local young men living in Puerto Viejo de Talamanca, a small Afro-Caribbean tourism town in Costa Rica, imagine, perform, and negotiate masculinities and fatherhood, in particular, through the diverse intimate encounters they establish with tourist women. To meet this objective I utilized a “youth-centered” approach, which stressed a participatory methodology. By using a combination of photovoice and visual anthropology, participants were asked to take and comment on photographs relevant to their understandings and everyday performances of masculinity and fatherhood in relation to tourism. To address the dynamic and complex linkages between global tourism, youth, masculinities, and fatherhood I draw upon the theoretical contributions in the anthropologies of youth, critical theories of masculinities and fatherhood, and theories regarding the commodification of intimacy, many of which, in their contemporary formulations, are underpinned by theories of gender performativity.