Tourism Social Media as a Fire Object

Abstract

Tourism studies have conceptualised social media as artefacts and networks of tangible objects based on neat distinctions and categorisations. Within the academic field of actor network theory (ANT) these neat ontological distinctions and categorisations have been problematised. John Law and Annemarie Mol are the scholars that most consequently have investigated the spatialities of messier ways to conceptualise and approach societal objects and the trajectories of societal phenomenon. The project initiated by Law and Mol is an effort to widen the ontological register that traditionally has dominated in social science research, tourist studies included. The purpose of this chapter is to address and problematise social media in tourism with the research of Law and Mol as an analytical and methodological lens.