Tourism Scholars Research Articles

Paulo Freire 100: A commentary from tourism scholars

This short commentary aims to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Paulo Freire and reflect on his indirect contribution to tourism research. The commentary starts introducing Freire for those still not familiar with his biography and to some of his key concepts. Following this introductory part, we present examples of both theoretical and empirical work developed in tourism literature that used Freire's theory. We finish reflecting on the importance of Freire work in our scholarship and encouraging readers to engage with his work.

Conducting an integrated perspective of academic networks and individual elements on tourism scholars’ innovation performance discovery

At present, tourism scholars face many challenges in innovation performance improvement, which has been widely considered by society. However, few studies have considered the joint impacts of multiple antecedents at the network and individual levels. Based on a case sample of 1513 Chinese tourism scholars with publications in international journals from 1983 to 2018, this study explores the joint impacts of scientific collaboration networks (SCNs) and individual diversity on innovation performance by a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). The research findings are as follow: (1) No single factor can alone lead to the high performance of tourism scholars, but structural holes, tie strengths and knowledge diversity are the key factors. (2) The configurations leading to the innovation performance of tourism scholars include three driving paths (structural holes' control, knowledge-authority driven, and authority-oriented type) and two inhibiting paths (low control-strong ties’ and high position-multichain inhibited type). (3) Alternative and complementary relationships exist between the antecedent conditions of innovation performance of tourism scholars. This study provides a new theoretical perspective and empirical basis to reveal the joint influence mechanism of the innovation performance of tourism scholars. It also helps optimize SCNs and improve academic innovation performance.

The Making of Capital City Tourism in South Africa

Capital city tourism is a significant theme for urban tourism scholarship. Existing international research on capital city tourism mainly concentrates on the global North. For the global South as a whole limited research examines capital cities as tourism destinations and for sub-Saharan Africa scholarship is minimal. This study contributes to the small body of writings that interrogate capital city tourism in the global South. Further, it marks a departure from the mainstream research focus on contemporary issues of capital city tourism by adopting an historical perspective on capital city tourism. Using a range of archival and documentary sources the analysis highlights the making of South Africa's capital city as a tourism destination. Under scrutiny is the historical evolution and changing character of tourism in Pretoria over a period of a half century from 1920 to 1975. It is shown that the distinctiveness of Pretoria's early tourism products were a reflection of its capital status. Definition of the tourism product base and its promotion were facilitated by the activities undertaken by national government promotion and the local Pretoria Publicity Association. An historical challenge for tourism development was the poor quality of local hotels, which were at a standard below international norms until at least the late 1960s. The difficulties of the accommodation services sector were compounded by the enactment of apartheid legislation from 1948 onwards, which required the existence of hotels as racialized and segregated spaces.

Promoting family business in handicrafts through local tradition and culture: an innovative approach

Purpose The purpose of the study is to investigate the potentiality and dimensions of promoting handicraft family business practices in handicraft as well as the extent to highlight the local tradition and culture. Design/methodology/approach This study is an insight from the existing relevant literature on family-owned businesses in handicrafts from time immemorial. Furthermore, data were collected from the 300 respondents using a purposive sampling procedure in which the rate of response was 67%. The structural equation modeling (i.e. SmartPLS 3.0) was used to analyze the construct and test the hypothesis. Findings According to the result, among the 4 hypothesized paths all were supported, but out of 22 relationship paths, 15 paths are considered significant This study shows the relationship among the promotional factors, economic factors and motivational factors, and support and challenges factors have a crucial effect on the adoption of handicraft family business. Research limitations/implications The findings of this study will assist the tourism scholars and managers to apprehend an authentic relationship between age-old practices of the family business as well as the legacy of the family business in art and crafts to empower the local people. Originality/value The study is a foremost to ascertain the critical success factors of the adoption of family business practices in art and crafts through rural tourism to empower the local economy.

Local Culinary Entrepreneurship As The Development Of Regional Gastronomy And Urban Tourism

Tourism development efforts are currently being pursued through the concept of sustainable tourism with a community-based tourism approach, providing great opportunities for the community to participate in tourism development; produce tourism product development from businesses managed by the community. However, a way is still needed so that all these developments can continue to increase the number of tourist visits. The emergence of tourism as an academic part of tourism studies and education, encourages tourism potential to continue to be developed. Such an attraction makes Sate Bandeng a gastronomic tour. Which is one of the right ways to raise the potential of local culinary. This article aims to show the progress of tourism since before the concept of sustainable tourism was applied to the present. The research method used is a description with a qualitative approach. This study is based on a review of secondary sources through literature research and personal communication with several scholars in tourism and tourism business services. There are not many articles that discuss local culinary entrepreneurship as a development of regional gastronomy and part of an urban tourism attraction, while the development of sustainable tourism has allowed tourism to stand alone, and it seems that tourism with all its derivatives has gained independence as a field of academic study and as a Study Program in Higher Education in Indonesia. Indonesia.

Pleasure Through Pain: An Empirical Examination of Benign Masochism in Tourism

Paradoxical at first sight, some tourists engage in activities involving negative emotions and even physical pain. Tourism scholars have begun investigating this phenomenon and have called for more of such research. Against this background, the authors introduce to tourism the notion of benign masochism, defining it as a trait describing a person’s tendency to embrace and seek pleasure through safely playing with a stimulating level of physical pain and negative emotions. In doing so, the authors root benign masochism in the notion of play from evolutionary psychology and develop a benign masochism scale that is able to predict various tourism outcomes, including willingness to visit a haunted house, to go on a challenging adventure holiday, and to visit a nuclear disaster site. The authors conclude by discussing theoretical and managerial implications as well as limitations and future opportunities for research.

Tourism and Politics: Responses to Crises in Island States

ABSTRACT Power and politics are crucial but often neglected topics in tourism scholarship. Issues of power particularly come to the fore when looking at what happens when the tourism sector responds to crises: this was very clear in the work that Professor David Harrison did examining the aftermath of several coup d’état in Fiji. His work provides a pathway to consider the more recent shocks in Fiji caused by the coronavirus pandemic. We examine how COVID-19 has impacted the Fijian tourism sector and people reliant on it, contrasting local examples of resilience with political responses that might be detrimental to the long-term recovery of Fiji’s economy. Tourism scholars need to move beyond apolitical analyses of the sector: all social scientists should be equipped to interrogate issues of power and politics in their research on tourism, just as David Harrison did in his work and in life in general.

NICHE TOURISM IN SOUTH AFRICA: A RENEWED POLICY FOCUS IN THE COVID-19 ENVIRONMENT

The COVID-19 pandemic is a catalyst for new patterns of demand and supply for the tourism sector. One consequence is a renewed policy interest in the importance of niche tourism products for destination development. This paper investigates the importance of niche tourism and its (re-) emergence on the policy agenda of tourism stakeholders in South Africa. It is argued that with a resurgence of niche tourism as policy focus there is a need for an extended research agenda on niche tourism in South Africa. The analysis represents a contribution to the changing agendas of tourism scholarship in the global South which have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Evolution of Rural Tourism in South Africa: An Historical Lens

This paper utilises archival research to provide a glimpse into the historical development of rural tourism in South Africa. It points to the minimal focus on historical studies in international scholarship on rural tourism. The analysis demonstrates rural tourism in South Africa is not a new phenomenon with a recorded history going back as far as the late 19th century. Different rural spaces are shown to be associated with different niche products of rural South Africa. The earliest forms of rural tourism were promoted to both groups of domestic and international visitors. Arguably, the evolutionary pathway of rural tourism in South Africa is different to that which has been documented in the Global North. Overall, the paper represents a contribution to the limited international literature on rural tourism in its historical aspects as well as to evolving rural tourism scholarship in South Africa. In addition, it offers an historical window on issues of tourism and change in the Global South.

Social media influencers’ visual framing of Iran on YouTube

ABSTRACT While previous studies have investigated the role of YouTube videos in producing and representing tourist destinations, they have rarely focused on how social media influencers (SMIs) frame specific destinations. SMIs constitute significant contributors to destination image, yet tourism scholars have not fully explored their persuasive power in framing destinations and affecting potential travellers. This article explores how Iran is framed as a travel destination by SMIs on YouTube by utilizing visual framing theory. As a country subject to both unfavourable framing by Western mainstream media and positive images by SMIs and YouTubers, Iran represents an interesting case study as a destination produced in the cyberworld with multiple and contrasting images and representations. Methodologically, the study integrates netnography and narrative analysis to examine the content of ten travel videos produced by international SMIs. The analysis and interpretation of the visual material unveil the multiple ways of framing Iran by SMIs, which tend to humanize Iran and Iranians, emphasize the country's culture and history, and attribute the misconceptions and fear about Iran to the current global and local political climate. Theoretically, this study advances our understanding of destination image through visual framing theory, which has rarely been applied to explore travel videos.

Reclaiming drama in tourism research: a dramatological analytic

ABSTRACT Drama as symbolic action is overlooked in tourism research failing to take into account how dramaturgic interactions shape touristic relations, spaces, and systems. This note presents a novel theoretical analytic to study symbolic action and embodied tourism performances. This dramatological perspective seeks to understand the civic dramaturgic processes of extracting shared meaning from the co-performance and instantiation of symbolic representations. It moves forward to reinstate the place of drama in tourism scholarship, and clear confusion from common misconceptions about the essence of drama in touristic settings and behaviours. It is shown that civic dramaturgy can advance our understanding of tourism as an embodied practice by complementing and expanding extant performance studies and theory interlinked with symbols, social interactions, imaginaries, and cultures.

Application of graph theory to mining the similarity of travel trajectories

Travel mobility has attracted considerable attention from tourism scholars. Studies have extensively discussed discovering key (i.e., collective) movement patterns. Recently, the advancement of information technology has allowed tourism researchers to obtain detailed information regarding travel digital footprints. This study, which analyzes mobile sensor big data, proposes a data mining approach to measure the similarity of travel trajectories by performing a pair comparison of individual trajectory. This method considers the spatial and temporal dimensions of travel flow to help identify trajectory similarity across individual travelers. Considering graph theory, this research also applies graph-based spatiotemporal analytics to identify important insights from complex travel mobility networks. As a result, this study suggests an innovative approach to assess travel trajectory similarity, which can be regarded as a type of data-driven clustering method. This paper also demonstrates the applicability of network science in travel mobility.

When words become difficult: a critical reflection of the ‘MeBox’ method in understanding senior travellers’ responses to loss

Multiple dimensions of our experiences such as visual, embodied and sensory experiences cannot always be easily expressed in words. Traditional qualitative methods may struggle to access these deep-rooted complex and emotional aspects. Tourism scholars have called for innovative methodologies to unravel layers of diverse meaning in phenomena. This article critically reflects on a visual tool called the ‘MeBox’. It was adopted in our study to explore senior travellers’ responses to loss following a major life event. The ‘MeBox’ method enabled participants to express embedded and tacit knowledge to reflect on their lived experiences. We critically review the ‘MeBox’ methodology, and provide practical learnings for scholars who may want to adopt this method as a means to understand lived experiences that are difficult to express in words.

When words become difficult: a critical reflection of the ‘MeBox’ method in understanding senior travellers’ responses to loss

Multiple dimensions of our experiences such as visual, embodied and sensory experiences cannot always be easily expressed in words. Traditional qualitative methods may struggle to access these deep-rooted complex and emotional aspects. Tourism scholars have called for innovative methodologies to unravel layers of diverse meaning in phenomena. This article critically reflects on a visual tool called the ‘MeBox’. It was adopted in our study to explore senior travellers’ responses to loss following a major life event. The ‘MeBox’ method enabled participants to express embedded and tacit knowledge to reflect on their lived experiences. We critically review the ‘MeBox’ methodology, and provide practical learnings for scholars who may want to adopt this method as a means to understand lived experiences that are difficult to express in words.

A change would do you good: advances in research impact in sustainable tourism and some ‘home truths’ for the sector

There is a growing impetus on academics working in higher education to evidence the wider impact (i.e. the social and economic benefits) of their research. As academic disciplines, tourism in general, and sustainable tourism more specifically, evolved to understand and address the real-world challenges and opportunities facing the sector. It is thus worrying that there are indications of a growing divide between researchers and beneficiaries. This editorial introduces a special issue of the Journal of Sustainable Tourism dedicated to showcasing examples of sustainable tourism research that are bucking the trend by clearly evidencing the applied value of research and the routes to creating change. First, we outline the footings of the ‘impact agenda’ within academia and examine the distinction between the impact in its academic and wider forms. With the focus on wider impact, we then consider its provenance within the field of sustainable tourism before outlining the themes underpinning the eight articles comprising this special issue. We end by considering the changes that are required within the academic environment and to the psyche and approach of tourism scholars in order to enhance the likelihood of wider impact being generated from the outcomes of scholarly activity within the field.

Envisioning the future of technology integration for accessible hospitality and tourism

PurposeThis study aims to examine a topic of growing significance to hospitality and tourism scholars and practitioners – how emerging technologies can fulfill accessible hospitality and tourism services for people with disabilities.Design/methodology/approachA systematic review of the literature based on the Web of Science database and qualitative research were conducted. Specifically, bibliometric analysis and thematic analyzes of expert interviews were used. The obtained views from experts in the field further validated and enriched the obtained findings.FindingsThe primary topics of exploration in existing literature were identified, such as social networks and data-empowered services. The potential areas of further advances are also revealed such as the need for cross-country collaborations and potential gaps between scholarly and practitioner interest in the topic.Research limitations/implicationsThis research is limited by the scope of adopted search keywords and databases.Practical implicationsThis study offers vital practical implications for the future integration of emerging technologies to fulfill accessible hospitality and tourism. It also demonstrates the pressing need for more interconnected global collaborations for this important initiative.Social implicationsThis study emphasizes how the hospitality and tourism industry could better leverage technological power to empower people with disabilities. It also points out the importance of an inclusive process for technology implementation for accessible hospitality and tourism services to fully represent the interests of disabled customers (including the consideration of their different backgrounds).Originality/valueThis study sheds light on the future research directions of technological empowerment of accessible hospitality/tourism. It also makes methodological contributions by demonstrating what bibliometric analysis has to offer to relevant fields of studies. The solicited views of experts in the field from different countries on the topic further add to the depth and value of the findings while demonstrating the combination of these two approaches as a promising mixed-methods route to produce richer and more robust findings.

‘Some glimpses of an Asian PhD journey in tourism’ – An ethnodrama

By combining three different genres – academic writing, theatrical playwriting and performing – this article presents different ways of knowing and representing realities for tourism scholars. More specifically, drawing upon social scientists' influential work on performance texts and an ethnodramatic script written by the authors based on dramatized ethnographic and autoethnographic fieldwork, it portrays a tourism PhD journey in an Asian institution. As an attempt of representing the power structures underpinning academia (and tourism academia), namely postcolonial, gendered, global, regional, institutional, and socio-cultural forces, among others, the 8 scenes constituting the script (one of which is enacted and presented in a video) discuss how Asian PhD journeys are shaped by specific approaches to supervision, issues of authorship, gendered dynamics and postcolonial legacies. The main rationale behind this work lies in the recognition of the powerful/performative role of embodied texts and performances in producing, shaping and re-presenting realities. More specifically, the ethnodrama presented in this paper and its embodied representation act as vehicles that are both political and entertaining in producing meanings.

Inducing wellbeing through staycation programs in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis

The COVID-19 pandemic aftermath has aggravated its traumatic effect to engender a mental health crisis. With increasingly worsened psychological wellbeing, it is the responsibility of tourism scholars and operators alike to explore how contemporary tourism offerings can enable individuals to rebuild hope and optimism through relishing tourism's restorative appeals amid rigid border lockdowns. However, it remains unclear whether tourists are able to restore themselves from staycation programs, since tourists have a tendency to favor a novel space, as opposed to a usual travel environment. To address this question, we relied upon a government-funded staycation campaign using a survey to assess a transformative process leading from travel motivation and restoration to fortifying psychological capital and wellbeing. Drawing on theories pertaining to attention restoration, psychological capital, and involvement, our findings unravel a travel transformative mechanism of staycation programs that build a linkage between travel motivation and favorable psychological outcomes amid adverse circumstances.

Tourism, the SDGs and partnerships

In 2019, Massey University in New Zealand hosted the world’s first research conference on tourism and the Sustainable Developments Goal (SDGs). The aims of this conference were to bring together a wide range of stakeholders to discuss (i) challenges to tourism contributing to the SDGs, and (ii) ways in which tourism can deliver on its potential to be more inclusive, equitable and sustainable. The need for diverse actors to work in partnership to achieve the SDGs emerged as a key theme. This special issue presents several of the papers from that conference, as well as contributions from a broader range of scholars. As is evident in this collection, partnerships in tourism tend to be complex, multi-faceted, subject to multiple legal frameworks and governance arrangements, and are often cross-sectoral, transnational and cross-border. While these overlapping factors can make it challenging for tourism actors to develop effective partnerships to deliver on the SDGs, the articles herein suggest there is considerable promise where stakeholders have shared values and commitments. Tourism scholars need to reflect more on possibilities for constructive partnerships because, as the pandemic milieu has demonstrated, partnerships spanning governments, industries and communities are a fundamental requirement to producing more sustainable tourism futures.

Exploring gastronomic tourism experiences through online platforms: evidence from Thai local communities

ABSTRACT Gastronomic (food) tourism is crucial for visitation and destination choices. Thailand tourism and its reputable cuisine can utilise the potential of online platforms as a channel to connect tourists to local communities. Despite massive online textual data in tourism, employing such insightful knowledge in theory and practice is still insufficient. This research explores gastronomic tourists’ experiences and their impacts on local communities in Thailand by conducting a qualitative approach to analyse local food experiences of gastronomic tourists’ reviews from five different online platforms. The results from 461 online reviews reveal positive tourists’ gastronomic experiences in Thailand. The gastronomic tourism offers and their contributions to local community destinations vary across online platforms. Additionally, all five online platforms facilitate the connection of gastronomic tourists and local people differently. In addition, the local online platforms offer a greater variety and uniqueness of gastronomic tourism experiences, including authentic food experiences, local interaction and community benefits, tailor-made cultural learning with locals, and social aspect of food that benefit local communities. This research benefits both tourism scholars and practitioners in filling the knowledge gap of employing available online tourism platforms to better understand, plan and design gastronomic tourism experiences in local communities.