Abstract
PurposeBy drawing on current reports, this paper positions that Homo sapiens could in the near future be faced with an increasingly uninhabitable planet. It emphasises the importance of adventure tourism and its associated activities as a means of supporting individuals to develop more outdoor survival skills.Design/methodology/approachThis study applies a scenario narrative approach in exploring and presenting potential future ideas. The significance of narratives lies at the essential examination of current trends and drivers that could be shaping future scenarios. This paper, through the exploration of past and current trends supports the researcher in presenting future views. The scenario narratives in this research are established via desk-based research and inspection of academic journals, industry reports, ideas and knowledge.FindingsIf society is pushed to the brink of extinction due to a catastrophic event(s), people will require survival skills, similar to those shared by our hunter-gather nomad ancestor. Thus, this paper highlights the value and importance of the industry in encouraging soft and hard outdoor adventure in the coming years. It recognises how different adventure travel activities can support people in rekindling with our more basic instincts and ultimately, surviving in different natural environments.Originality/valueThis paper offers original theoretical knowledge within the adventure tourism literature. Offering original consideration to the value of exploring the past as a method of understanding the future, the paper presents an original spectrum of soft and hard skills-based adventure tourism activities.
Highlights
Society is never far away from presenting visuals and ideas of humanity living on the edge of existence
The question isn’t so much whether humans survive the three or three hundred thousand years, but whether we can do more than just survive” (Longrich, 2020). This quote sets a vivid image of a potential future and a vision that this paper explores in more detail in order to set the parameters around the value of preparedness and how adventure tourism can play its part in the eventuality of any above scenario becoming a reality
If humans do eventually come to a time and place that only a few hundred thousand people remain, holding on, trying to avoid extinction, could we look back to the skills of our ancestors as a means to j j VOL. ▪▪▪ NO. ▪▪▪ 2021 JOURNAL OF TOURISM FUTURES PAGE 7 continuous revival? Some communities today still hold survival skills that many of society do not
Summary
Society is never far away from presenting visuals and ideas of humanity living on the edge of existence. 1-17, Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 2055-5911 JOURNAL OF TOURISM FUTURES PAGE 1 ancestor laid the foundations to what we are more accustomed to today, living in communities, with shared values and supporting one another, with services and facilities to cater for our basic human need(s). Therein lies the focus of this paper, the value of adventure tourism in developing a society (or individuals) that can reconnect and survive in nature It does so as a means of stressing that in the event of catastrophic change to the environment, society might be forced to adapt. This paper offers original value to the importance of adventure tourism and its related activities It continues to shine a light on the value of past and present-day trends as a means to envisage the future, but how they are part of the entangled and developing nature of our social and natural evolution
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