Tropentoerisme: in Nederlands-Indië, 1870-1945

Abstract

This dissertation examines how tourism in the Dutch East Indies (present-day Indonesia) between 1870 and 1945 was connected to colonial power structures and ideologies. While existing scholarship often adopts an institutional approach, this research shifts the focus to the experiences of primarily European tourists, as recorded in and constructed through travel texts and visual media. The central question is how these documented experiences were linked to the exercise of colonial power. Particular attention is paid to accommodations and modes of transport – two structural but previously understudied pillars of colonial tourism – and the ways in which they helped shape the ‘tourist gaze’ and reproduced or challenged colonial hierarchies. Theoretically grounded in postcolonial and tourism studies, with an emphasis on representation, this research analyzes a corpus of travel journals, guidebooks, commercial print, and visual sources. It shows how colonial hotels, which presented themselves as safe European enclaves, were actually sites where social and racial boundaries were contested. Additionally, the study demonstrates how different means of transport shaped the possibilities and limitations of the tourist gaze. Finally, the dissertation addresses how this colonial legacy persists in contemporary Indonesian tourism, while being rewritten from Indonesian perspectives.