Tourists in Jai-Alai. Between the activation of social memory and cultural simulation

Abstract

This article presents an anthropological approach to the process through which Gernika’s Jai-Alai court has become part of our cultural heritage and its uses for tourism. I attempt to explain the process of taking advantage of the court building’s potential as a monument, as well as the game itself, through a reconstruction of its place in our historical memory, as collected in two books, and an archive-museum project. In addition, I analyse the stimulus given to the game by the school for young players and especially by the exhibitions included in tourist packages. These hands-on exhibitions make it possible to present the connections between objects and persons, lending the game the necessary emotional element to turn it into a mechanism for meaning.