Who knows a city and the stories of its streets more than its taxi drivers? So who better than taxi drivers to tell those stories? In the 1990s after decades of bitter sectarian violence, taxi drivers in Belfast, Northern Ireland began offering Black Taxi Tours. In what could be considered either propaganda or commodification these tours take tourists past the sites of gunfights, massacres, and acts of official brutality, past politically significant sites like the Sinn Fein headquarters and the Peace mural as they relate stories of what has become known as the Troubles. Most importantly the taxi drivers ferry their passengers past dozens of murals, (complete with photo ops) that function like displays in the living museum that is the still divided city of Belfast. Like museum displays, the murals compel their viewers to contemplate the history of what has taken place there. This paper will discuss this, the role of the tourist versus the local, and the relationships between Belfast’s internal dynamics and its international reputation. The activism of the mural artists will be explained and the activist orientation of the taxi drivers will be questioned. The relationships between making peace and making profit will be explored.
About the presenterLaurie Gilmore Selleck
Professor of Visual Communications and Associate Dean for Assessment of Student Learning at Cazenovia College