The luxury of leisure and pleasure at the New Zealand second home

Abstract

Second homes in New Zealand have a long history and are an important part of the New Zealand culture. Increasingly over the last few decades, the popular media has constructed ownership of the traditional second home, or ‘bach’, and the associated lifestyle, as democratic and as such, the antithesis of luxury. This paper provides a new perspective through an examination of media representations of leisure and pleasure at the second home in New Zealand through a thematic discourse analysis of Home New Zealand magazine. A critical examination of the representations of luxury through leisure and pleasure at the second home shows consistent and recurrent tropes over the years of publication. These include the luxury of eating, playing and relaxing. The paper argues that leisure and pleasure at the New Zealand second home, as represented in Home New Zealand, has always carried connotations of luxury. This provides a significant point of departure not only from the popular mass media constructions but also from much of the academic literature.