Development of ethnic tourism in polyethnic space (the example of Chernivtsi)

The algorithm and the methods of social-geographic study of ethnic tourism within poly-ethnic environment of a big city have been suggested. The stages to study ethnic tourism resources have been analyzed as follows: the study of geographical and historical specificities of formation of population ethnic structure; establishment of the degree of population ethnic variety and its dynamics; the study of the material and the spiritual cultural heritage of ethnic groups; quantitative estimation of attractiveness of ethnic tourism objects; mapping of ethnic tourism objects and development of ethnographic excursion routes.
 
Chernivtsi as polyethnic and multi-cultural city is a notable example of sustainability of the development of ethnic tourism. The poly-ethnicity and multiculturality of the city was favored by its ethno-geographic disposition at the junction of three ethnic lands and the centuries-old history when the city was part of different states where each state essentially effected on population’s ethnic structure and left its imprint on city-planning and architectural environment as well as on its citizens’ material and spiritual culture. Chernivtsi is regarded to be an architectural pearl (represented by various architectural styles), and is downtown possesses the status of the area of conservation. The Government has registered 706 monuments of cultural heritage in Chernivtsi, where 20 monuments are of national value, and the architectural ensemble of the former residency of Bukovynian and Dalmatian Metropolitans is included into the UN List of World Heritage Sites.
 
The objects of cultural heritage of the old city were grouped and systemized by their ethnic belonging. Relative quantitative (point-based) evaluation of ethnic tourism resources was conducted as to degree of their attractiveness. The whole diversity of ethnic tourism resources was for the purpose of primary point-based evaluation grouped into 15 blocks, each of them having their own specificity, own cognitive and attractive potentiality, and own methods of their study. Evaluation scales take into account the significance, aesthetic attractiveness, and the informative value of ethnic tourism objects.
 
Ukrainians, Germans, Austrians, Romanians and Moldavians, Jews, Poles, Armenians were those ethnic groups that left the most notable “traces” in the material and spiritual cultural heritage within the poly-ethnic space of Chernivtsi. Mapping the objects of ethnic tourism allowed for the establishment of particularities of spatial disposition of the objects of respective ethnic culture and subsequent development of excursion routes to the biggest ethnic communities of Chernivtsi.
 
Novelty. The objects of cultural heritage of Chernivtsi were grouped and systemized according to their ethnic belonging; the attractiveness of all ethnic tourism objects was evaluated according to developed point-based scale. Mapping the objects of ethnic tourism was helpful in the development of ethnographic excursion routes to the biggest ethnic communities of the city.