Les guides touristiques : vers de nouvelles pratiques discursives de contamination

Abstract

Following the traditional French school of discourse analysis, the discourse of French guidebooks is approached as a discursive production registered in a social field, which tends to open up to other discursive practices through a contamination phenomenon. We examine how some extra-discursive communication practices (Internet, written press and television) directly affect discursive practices by playing the role of evolution factors; we show how discursive practices are less and less hermetic to other kinds of media. The information carried and the routine specific to guidebooks tend to shift to other discursive genres (multimedia or written press) which will in turn influence and shape them according to their own standards. Whether it is carried out by the enunciation types of new media or by magazines, the contamination is the result of an adaptation of the discourse of guidebooks to social practices. These discourses fit into a social field, which is both specific (discourses with touristic content) and general (knowledge transmission discourses), sometimes relying on discourse communities, which they contribute themselves to establish.

Keywords

• touristic communication
• discourse of guidebooks