THE POTENTIAL OF HANDCRAFT ACTIVITIES IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF CREATIVE AND SUSTAINABLE TOURIST DESTINATIONS

Abstract

This paper discusses the handicraft as a creative industry with potential for the development of sustainable tourist destinations, for its great cultural and symbolic values. Such an assumption refers to a theoretical study with an eminently qualitative approach, which systematizes the main concepts addressed in the literature, and draws reflections based upon articulated sets of critical remarks on the analyzed scenario. It uses a conception of handicraft as a creative process, with the likelihood of a tourist to accompany and experience such a process. It is argued that the development of tourist destinations from the handicraft contributes to enhancing the creative tourism, where, besides a passive enjoyment, the tourist seeks for experience of interacting with the local community. Likewise, the association between handcraft and tourism may be assumed as a strategy capable of boosting the tourism activity, and ensure its sustainability. Such as conception of creative tourism is innovative, being considered a fertile field for the design of strategies focused on differentiation, added value and sustainability of tourist destinations.