Posthuman Encounters in Heritage Tourism: Digital Mediation and Cultural Memory in Siak Sri Indrapura

Abstract

This article examines how digitally mediated encounters at heritage tourism sites reconfigure cultural memory, tourist subjectivity, and sustainable development through a posthumanist lens. Focusing on Siak Sri Indrapura in Indonesia, the study draws from key posthuman thinkers including Haraway, Braidotti, Hayles, and Ferrando to analyze how tourists become relational nodes within networks of bodies, machines, and affect. Using critical posthuman cartography and digital ethnography, the research reveals how augmented reality, algorithms, and multisensory environments destabilize traditional notions of authenticity and cultural preservation. The paper argues for an ethical, inclusive, and distributed rethinking of tourism practice in the posthuman era.