Yes, I personally feel that tourism is the culprit in commodifying cultures and traditions. The significance commodification occurred at the Baba Nyonya architecture located at Malacca and Penang. Instead of using the Baba-Nyonya as a heritage site, the people there use it as their residential place as well as to carry out their daily business. Because the Baba-Nyonya architecture supposedly only served as heritage site, yet the people there commodify it. They use it for the business purposes. Some of the owner of business even sells the traditional handicrafts or souvenirs related to Baba-Nyonya. Hence the authenticity of the site is no longer there anymore. Some tourists might even just buy a Baba-Nyonya traditional handicraft as souvenirs and bring it to their own country and claim themselves had been to Penang or Malacca. However, the tourists did not know the traditions and cultures of Baba-Nyonya. They never go in-depth to understand and learn the Baba-Nyonya culture. Hence, this will lead to the dilution of the culture.
The Rainforest World Music Festival in Sarawak Cultural Village is another commodification. In order to participate in this festival, ticket is needed. And most importantly is the ticket price is very expensive. The organizer divided it into 1 day pass and 3 days pass which cost differently. The 3 days pass costs RM 300 while the 1 day pass costs RM 110. So obvious that the organizer had commodified the music festival and sell it to the tourists. The music festival artists include the indigenous group. Hence, it should not be charged because music is also part of culture. When the festival is held, around there has the stall. All those stalls are selling the culture products such as handicrafts and some of the traditional items. Hence again the culture is being commodified to earn money.
Malacca was listed as UNESCO world heritage site at 2008. This award has help to bring in a lot of cultural tourists. The local government try hard to conserve and preserve all the heritage site. However, this award has lead to commodification indirectly. Because Malacca now is flooded with cultural tourists, a lot of business man take this golden opportunity to earn money. Around the heritage site you are able to see different stall is selling different kind of traditional handicrafts. Again, some tourists bought it as souvenirs and claim themselves went to Malacca.
