Volunteering in Latin America: Voluntourism

Voluntourism: What is it?

What does "Voluntourism" mean?

Voluntourism is a combination of the words "Volunteer" and "Tourism"

Whether you have heard the term or not, "voluntourism" is not too difficult to decipher. A mixture of volunteering and travelling abroad, voluntourism is a rapidly-growing trend, and volunteering in Latin America is one of the most popular ways to experience voluntourism. Before you set out on your gap year, however, it is important to know more precisely what voluntourism is - and what it isn't.

Voluntourism is:

  • Volunteering to help people, wildlife, or the ecosystem abroad
  • Diving deeper into a culture than the regular tourist

Supervising street children in Guatemala, caring for zoo animals in Venezuela, or protecting native wildlife on the Galápagos Islands are all ways that you can help people, animals, and the environment in gap year projects in Latin America - and those are just a few examples. Aside from this, many volunteering programmes in Latin America offer the chance to learn Spanish or Portuguese in intensive language courses. Language learning combined with travel and volunteer work bring voluntourists much closer to the local culture than regular tourists ever have the chance to come.

Voluntourism: What ISN'T it??

With language learning, travel, and volunteering, it seems that voluntourism encompasses just about everything about experiencing a Latin American country. However, it is important to note that voluntourism is not without its limits.

Voluntourism is NOT:

  • Going to solve all the world's problems
  • An attempt to "improve" the local culture

Most important:

Keep an open mind, and try to understand your host country's cultural differences.

In their excitement to help people in Latin America, many volunteers become overly-optimistic about what they will accomplish abroad. They expect to see major changes resulting from their volunteering efforts, and end up disappointed when their great expectations go unmet.

In reality, most of the problems which you will be volunteering to solve are too big for just one person to handle, and progress is slow. If you focus on the small ways that you are able to help, such as keeping young children off the streets, you will find volunteering in Latin America much more rewarding.

Another thing to keep in mind: Voluntourism is not meant as a way to change the culture of your host country. If you find yourself thinking that the culture is inefficient or unorganised, remember to stay flexible. Volunteers who constantly try to impose their own culture wear out their welcome with local people. Just keep an open mind, and you will learn to understand or at least to appreciate different ways of doing things.