Welcome Wolverhampton and Lincoln tourism students, as well as other visitors! Our virtual conference is now well-established as a highlight of final year tourism studies, a forum for the discussion of ideas, of pushing boundaries, of critical questions – and hopefully, some solutions.
This year, in line with our theme, we are inviting you to explore the social, cultural and political dimensions of tourism in the early 21st century.
Among key questions are: what factors shape our desire to travel? How do an uncertain security environment and its attendant risks affect tourist behaviour? Can tourists help to create world peace? Who determines what an ‘authentic’ experience is? How do issues of class, race, age and gender affect access to tourism? Can access to tourism be made fairer? How do tourists ‘read’ artistic productions on holiday?
This is bound to be an exciting conference – we urge you to explore all the conference stands to find out what you and your colleagues are saying about these issues.
There are five strands in the conference:
Strand 1: Tragedies, risks and rewards: travelling in an uncertain world
Strand 2: Becoming a tourist: how backgrounds shape preferences
Strand 3: Love, peace and paradise: tourism as a positive force in the world
Strand 4: Tourism denied: factors restricting holiday-taking
Strand 5: Consuming or decommodifying? Tourist interactions in destinations
