Marino JAÉN ESPINOSA
(PanamaTipico.com, Panama City, Republic of Panama)
Abstract:
The perote is a non-religious, day-long pilgrimage from the Panamanian town of Santo Domingo de Las Tablas to the Uverito Beach and then back. It includes many intangible cultural heritage manifestations such as traditional music, songs, dances and pranks. Despite being a unique tradition in the region and having a significant cultural tourism potential, the perote has not been extensively researched and is not well known outside of its home province.
While digital maps are a common tool for storytelling tours of tangible cultural heritage sites, they are less common in the realm of intangible cultural heritage assets such as the perote. Thus, the goal of this work is to use a digital map in a creative way to increase awareness of this festivity, in order to help its preservation and to increase its value as a cultural tourism attraction.
The methodology followed in this project began with an initial research stage that included interviews with organizers of the perote, in order to establish important information such as the origin of the festivity, its seasonality and frequency, and the activities that take place during the celebration.
A second stage consisted of mapping the main locations involved in the celebration. This was done by using an online application for creating and publishing maps. This process involved attending several perotes and observing each activity in the field, while recording geographic coordinates, schedules, and multimedia content of the festivity.
The result of this work is an online representation of the perote, in which each activity’s location and schedule is marked at a map and linked to explanatory texts, pictures, videos and/or audio files. The maps are presented both in Spanish, the official language of Panama, and in English, in order to make it accesible for an international audience.
Keywords: cultural heritage, traditional festivity, digital storytelling, Panama, digital map