Kajian “Spirit Of Place” untuk Meningkatkan Daya Tarik Wisata di Kawasan Kota Medan, Indonesia

Abstract

Every place or area has a "spirit" that can be felt by humans which creates the image or character of that place. To feel the spirit of a place, the place must have an atmosphere that gives it a special meaning. Research that discusses the study of the spirit of place and what can form the spirit of place in an area or historic building has not yet been developed. Spirit of place is formed from tangible aspects in the form of a building, environment, or man-made objects, as well as intangible aspects in the form of memories, narratives, events/festivals, rituals, traditional knowledge, meanings and so on. Places or areas with a clear spirit of place are generally heritage buildings. Various phenomena that occur from community activities emerge in creating the soul of the area. This can affect the condition of tourism areas in the region and raises questions, such as how is the spirit of place in historic buildings in Medan City and how can spirit of place become a tourist attraction for historic buildings in Medan City. The selected locations in this study were divided into 3 (three clusters), namely Maimun Palace, Tjong A Fie Mansion and Pos Bloc. The method used in this research is qualitative phenomenology, where phenomenological research identifies the "essence" of human experience regarding a phenomenon, then interviews and field observations are conducted to review research locations to obtain data. This study uses methodological triangulation analysis, namely by analyzing the results of interviews and observation methods to study a situation or phenomenon, as well as the application of content analysis as a subjective interpretation of the contents of text data through a classification/coding process of the resulting data. The research found that the tangible aspect that forms the spirit of place consists of two elements, the first is the architectural element which is influenced by historic buildings and buildings as places for various communities. Then there are landscape elements that are influenced by buildings as tourism and buildings as public spaces. In the intangible aspect, the elements that make up the spirit of place are activity and memory. The element of activity is influenced by the building as a means of education, and the building as a place to play. Meanwhile, the memory element is formed by the influence of the building as an experience and the building as a marker of one's existence. This study reinforces Schulz and Garnham's theory which states that the spirit of place can indeed be formed by several forming aspects. With the Spirit of Place, it is proven to be a very significant tourist attraction for tourists referring to the characteristics and uniqueness of providing authentic experiences, emotional connections, educational values, visual beauty and local identity making tourists feel connected to the history, culture and heritage of a place.