- Email: [email protected]
Philosophical Issues in Tourism
958
Book Reviews / Tourism Management 32 (2011) 957–962
here derives from the three case studies being researched - Lord of the Rings, Star Wars and The Sound of Music as highlighted previously. The analysis of these results is well integrated into the literature and Table 4.3 simplifies this data. Macionis (2004) investigates film induced tourist motivation which the author analyses here in in-depth. The structure of the results and the layout of the illustrations (Bar charts) allow the reader to simplistically analyse the results. The results are broken down into the three case studies and discussed separately. These could be used for a best practice analysis elsewhere. In Part 2, Chapters 5, 6 and 7 looks at ‘The Spiritual, Physical and Social Location Encounters’. ‘Film tourism gazing’ is scrutinised. Personal quotes and pictures from the research study are used to support the author’s key points. This is one of the first instances where I have seen such a thorough analysis of this concept within the film tourism literature. Once again the author uses the data from his primary research to support his discussion. This is a very practically focused chapter but there is no major input from the academic literature to support the primary data used which is a major drawback of this chapter. Chapter 8 fits in nicely with the theme of the book but I do wonder if some elements of this chapter should have been placed earlier in the book e.g. ‘Characteristics of Film Location Tourists’. Figure 8.3 – ‘Configuration of the sense of a film imagined place’ is introduced and discussed here. Finally, Chapter 9 concludes with an examination of the concept of ‘The Experiences of Film Location Tourists’ using the results of this research study. It provides a detailed synopsis of the book and makes some enlightening suggestions in developing a model – Figure 9.1 Developing a film tourism strategy and management plan, which seems to be the main output of this book. Figure 9.1 appears to have originated from both the marketing and film induced tourism literature, most notably Beeton 2002; Hudson and Ritchie 2006; Macionis, 2004; O’Connor, Flanagan and Gilbert, 2010. This chapter also looks at the future challenges and implication facing the film tourism stakeholders particularly Tour Operators, Destination Marketing Organisations and Film Commissions. Lastly, chapter 9 concludes with an overview of the further research opportunities within the field of film induced tourism. The book presents some interesting information on an underresearched and an up-to-date area of film induced tourism and more specifically the Experiences of Film Location Tourists. This research could be expanded further and used as a comparative case study with another case study such as Australia or South Korea who have all experienced the positive and negative impacts of film induced tourism situations at filming locations. On a more positive note the book is appropriate for the topic under discussion and there is an excellent use of current research findings. It is based on a very interesting topic, which will make a valuable contribution to the tourism, media, destination management and marketing and destination management literature. Noëlle O’Connor Dr. Limerick Institute of Technology, Ireland E-mail address: [email protected] doi:10.1016/j.tourman.2010.05.001
Philosophical Issues in Tourism, J Tribe (Ed.). Channel View Publications, Bristol (2009). p. 320 ISBN: 978-1-84541-097-1 (hbk) £59.95; ISBN: 978-1-84541-096-4 (pbk) £24.95 Amongst the plethora of books and academic articles published on Tourism (Tribe in his introductory chapter notes that a recent
search of the CABI abstract service recorded 50,000 items) there are relatively few which reflect on the ways in which we think about tourism, the study of tourism and the application of research findings. Of course, PhD theses all have a section to deal with such matters, but the authors quickly move on to empirical matters and methods. The buzz of conversation after the sessions at tourism conferences often starts with the sharing of our travel experiences to get there, or intentions afterwards, and sometimes we touch on the consequences of our actions as tourists. We may ask each other what are you researching now? and sometimes we discuss our methodological preferences or practices. Over a convivial glass or two we sometimes ask a newly met colleague about his or her disciplinary background. But seldom do we look over the rim of our wine or beer glasses and seek to know about each other’s ontological or epistemological stances, or compare our paradigmatic positions. More formally, Botterill (2001, p. 199) notes that “The assumptions that underlie social science research in tourism are seldom made explicit.” Tourism researchers tend to work “within the specific boundaries of the main discipline in which they have been trained. Existing tourism theory is thus fragmented and weak.” (Echtner & Jamal, 1997, p. 868). Belhassen and Caton (2009, p. 335) argue for “a framework for exploring knowledge progression that includes the components of tourism morphology, or the creation and adjustment of concepts and models; the production and promotion of new interpretations and understandings; and the employment of such interpretations for the purpose of problem solving oriented to the needs of practitioners and policymakers”. Tourism is not alone in recognising dilemmas in its approaches and in seeking to establish stronger academic foundations (see for example Westbrook, 2008 discussing problems for ethnography). Development, even change in research is not new, as Holmes, (2008, p. 468) points out; science is now “starting to look back and rediscover its beginnings. but perhaps most important. is a changing appreciation of how scientists themselves fit into a society, and the nature of the particular creativity they bring to it.” In contrast to the natural sciences which seek to explain natural events and their causes “work in the humanities and qualitative social inquiry aims primarily at description (above all at thick description), at an understanding of meaning or (as it is often rather oddly put) of meanings, but eschews normative claims. It seeks to discover, articulate or analyse how the world has been represented in one or another text, image, discourse. or what is now called identity (and used, less confusedly, be spoken of as sense of identity). It therefore sees normative claims as legitimate, indeed important, objects of study, but not as its proper aim (O’Neill, 2009, p. 220, italics in original). Philosophical Issues in Tourism consists of 16 chapters contributed by a total of 21 authors, and is presented in 4 Parts. Part 1 is John Tribe’s Editorial introduction, mainly providing a concise overview of the ensuing chapters. It should be read by everyone using this book. Part 2 Truth: Reality, Knowledge and Disciplines is an attempt to “place the process of tourism knowledge production under scrutiny and to consider more carefully what it means to know” (p. 6). This explores “the conceptualisations and problematiques of the terms tourists and tourism” (p. 6), it also considers the production of knowledge about tourism, post-disciplinarity epistemology, and the benefits of adopting the wider framing offered by mobility. The five chapters in Part 2 examine Who is a Tourist? Conceptual and Theoretical Development; What is Tourism? Definitions, Theoretical Phases and Principals; Epistemology, Ontology and Tourism; Post-disciplinary Tourism; and The End of Tourism? Nomadology and the Mobilities Paradigm.
Book Reviews / Tourism Management 32 (2011) 957–962
Part 3 Beauty, Wellbeing, Aesthetics and Art considers “the contribution of tourism to individual wellbeing and spirituality” (p. 10). The five chapters in this section cover Tourism and Restoration; Aesthetic Pleasures: Contemplating Spiritual Tourism; Nature Beauty and Tourism; Tourism and the Aesthetic of the Built Environment; and Tourism and the Arts. Part 4 “engages with the concept of virtue in tourism. Virtue signifies moral excellence and goodness and belongs with ethics in the branch of philosophy that analyses values, right conduct and considers the meaning of the good life (p. 16). The five chapters are Ethics and Tourism; Good Actions in Tourism; Against ‘Ethical Tourism’; Development and its Discontents: Ego-tripping without Ethics or Idea(l)s?; and the book concludes with a chapter entitled Transmodernity: Remaking our (Tourism) World? (brackets above in the original). I have some criticisms of this otherwise excellent book. Firstly, it will be evident to most of my colleagues that an informed and comprehensive treatment of philosophical issues in tourism is an important and timely contribution to the continuing development of tourism studies. But it seems to me that the length constraint (300 pages, presumably imposed by the Publisher) does not allow the editor to do full justice to the importance, complexity, range and challenge of his subject. Contemplating spiritual tourism Singh and Singh (chapter 8) include a succinct overview of philosophical issues for non-western cultures, but where are the chapters, for example, on the rather different Asiatic philosophical stances towards tourism, or concerning their research values and traditions of scholarship? Also absent from this compendium is a full and vigorous discussion of the limitations of traditional Western mechanistic and comparative-static thinking (still too apparent in much tourism writing, in my opinion). Nor does it deal adequately with the significance of equifinality in analysing and understanding complex, evolving and indeterminate social systems. My second criticism is that this book and its readers would really benefit from more by the Editor, particularly in the form of a Conclusion. John Tribe is an ideal Editor for a book on this subject, his own scholarship and his position as Editor of Annals of Tourism Research gives him the authority to present his own understanding and views in much more detail than appears in this book. If this book goes into a second edition, as it deserves to, I urge the publisher to provide space for at least a full concluding chapter by John. Philosophical Issues in Tourism might well succeed in widening our informal and formal discussions (discourses?) to embrace not just what we study, but the ways in which our knowledge is advancing. Beyond what is explicit, I detect some themes woven through the chapters which perhaps make for uncomfortable reading: Why is a shared definition of tourism and tourists so elusive? Is the study of tourism necessarily dependant on the main disciplines from which it is developing, and if so, which are the more relevant? Why is the study of tourism relatively disregarded by academic managers? What has, or will, tourism contribute to other disciplines? Is the positivistic purpose of much tourism research evidence of a weakly theorised field of study? Will it be helpful to be more explicit about the fuzziness of many of our concepts, the vagueness of some of our methodologies, and to recognise that tourism is a complex, evolving and indeterminate social system? Is tourism the appropriate scale of enquiry, or should we be concerned with broader human issues such as mobilities? What, in fact, is distinctive about tourism as an individual, social and economic activity?
959
Akiyora, in Chapter 4 (p. 75) seems best to sum up the benefits of the book by pointing out that “a thorough reflection on various ontological and epistemological perspectives can serve to situate the enquiry into a proper philosophical context in the process of knowledge construction. This is important because it is not uncommon for those in the tourism academe to be challenged to defend their subject matter in different environments.” Despite some strictures, I congratulate John Tribe for his initiative, and I applaud Channel View for publishing Philosophical Issues in Tourism. John Tribe and the 21 contributors to this book challenge us all to take a measured look at the meaning, extent and significance of the study of tourism. Taken together, the 16 chapters in Philosophical Issues in Tourism provide an extensive, if not fully comprehensive reader for the more critical understanding of what it means to study tourism in the early part of the Twenty first century. Each chapter can be taken separately, and many will probably come to be recommended selectively on post graduate courses, or for the most advanced undergraduates. But lecturers and research students will benefit from reading the book as a whole. References Belhassen, Y., & Caton, K. (2009). Advancing understandings: a linguistic approach to tourism epistemology. Annals of Tourism Research, 36(2), 335–352. Botterill, D. (2001). The epistemology of a set of tourism studies. Leisure Studies, 20 (3), 199–214. Echtner, C., & Jamal, T. (1997). The disciplinary dilemma of tourism studies. Annals of Tourism Research, 24(4), 868–883. Holmes, R. (2008). The age of wonder: How the romantic generation discovered the beauty and terror of science. London: Harper Press. O’Neill, O. (2009). Applied ethics: naturalism, normativity and public policy. Journal of Applied Philosophy, 26(3), 219–230. Westbrook, D. (2008). Navigators of the contemporary: Why ethnography matters. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Eric Laws James Cook University, Cairns, Australia E-mail address: [email protected] doi:10.1016/j.tourman.2010.05.002
Marketing Innovations for Sustainable Destinations, Alan Fyal, Metin Kozak, Luisa Andreu, Juergen Gnoth, Sonja Sibila Lebe (Eds.). Goodfellow Publishing, Oxford (2009). p. 334, ISBN: 9781-906884-05-5 Marketing innovations for sustainable destinations is a compilation of 25 papers presented at the 3rd Advances in Tourism Marketing Conference (ATMC 2009) held in Bournemouth, UK in September 2009. In the chapter that follows the introduction, the papers are divided into three themes: consumer decision making and tourist experience; destination image, positioning and branding; and destination stakeholders and networks. Each part contains 11, 9 and 5 related articles respectively by a variety of authors. This book discusses core marketing topics from an international perspective, providing theoretical, practical and application issues of consumer behavior and marketing which can be simultaneously useful to academic researchers, policy makers and practitioners. A variety of study sites, from mainstream to peripheral destinations and from the West to the East, is a definite advantage of this book. Evidence of marketing innovations that the title of this book indicates can be found from resourceful and diverse study sites and contexts. In addition, data analyses adopted both quantitative and qualitative methods, although the former is more prevalent, added
Book Reviews / Tourism Management 32 (2011) 957–962
here derives from the three case studies being researched - Lord of the Rings, Star Wars and The Sound of Music as highlighted previously. The analysis of these results is well integrated into the literature and Table 4.3 simplifies this data. Macionis (2004) investigates film induced tourist motivation which the author analyses here in in-depth. The structure of the results and the layout of the illustrations (Bar charts) allow the reader to simplistically analyse the results. The results are broken down into the three case studies and discussed separately. These could be used for a best practice analysis elsewhere. In Part 2, Chapters 5, 6 and 7 looks at ‘The Spiritual, Physical and Social Location Encounters’. ‘Film tourism gazing’ is scrutinised. Personal quotes and pictures from the research study are used to support the author’s key points. This is one of the first instances where I have seen such a thorough analysis of this concept within the film tourism literature. Once again the author uses the data from his primary research to support his discussion. This is a very practically focused chapter but there is no major input from the academic literature to support the primary data used which is a major drawback of this chapter. Chapter 8 fits in nicely with the theme of the book but I do wonder if some elements of this chapter should have been placed earlier in the book e.g. ‘Characteristics of Film Location Tourists’. Figure 8.3 – ‘Configuration of the sense of a film imagined place’ is introduced and discussed here. Finally, Chapter 9 concludes with an examination of the concept of ‘The Experiences of Film Location Tourists’ using the results of this research study. It provides a detailed synopsis of the book and makes some enlightening suggestions in developing a model – Figure 9.1 Developing a film tourism strategy and management plan, which seems to be the main output of this book. Figure 9.1 appears to have originated from both the marketing and film induced tourism literature, most notably Beeton 2002; Hudson and Ritchie 2006; Macionis, 2004; O’Connor, Flanagan and Gilbert, 2010. This chapter also looks at the future challenges and implication facing the film tourism stakeholders particularly Tour Operators, Destination Marketing Organisations and Film Commissions. Lastly, chapter 9 concludes with an overview of the further research opportunities within the field of film induced tourism. The book presents some interesting information on an underresearched and an up-to-date area of film induced tourism and more specifically the Experiences of Film Location Tourists. This research could be expanded further and used as a comparative case study with another case study such as Australia or South Korea who have all experienced the positive and negative impacts of film induced tourism situations at filming locations. On a more positive note the book is appropriate for the topic under discussion and there is an excellent use of current research findings. It is based on a very interesting topic, which will make a valuable contribution to the tourism, media, destination management and marketing and destination management literature. Noëlle O’Connor Dr. Limerick Institute of Technology, Ireland E-mail address: [email protected] doi:10.1016/j.tourman.2010.05.001
Philosophical Issues in Tourism, J Tribe (Ed.). Channel View Publications, Bristol (2009). p. 320 ISBN: 978-1-84541-097-1 (hbk) £59.95; ISBN: 978-1-84541-096-4 (pbk) £24.95 Amongst the plethora of books and academic articles published on Tourism (Tribe in his introductory chapter notes that a recent
search of the CABI abstract service recorded 50,000 items) there are relatively few which reflect on the ways in which we think about tourism, the study of tourism and the application of research findings. Of course, PhD theses all have a section to deal with such matters, but the authors quickly move on to empirical matters and methods. The buzz of conversation after the sessions at tourism conferences often starts with the sharing of our travel experiences to get there, or intentions afterwards, and sometimes we touch on the consequences of our actions as tourists. We may ask each other what are you researching now? and sometimes we discuss our methodological preferences or practices. Over a convivial glass or two we sometimes ask a newly met colleague about his or her disciplinary background. But seldom do we look over the rim of our wine or beer glasses and seek to know about each other’s ontological or epistemological stances, or compare our paradigmatic positions. More formally, Botterill (2001, p. 199) notes that “The assumptions that underlie social science research in tourism are seldom made explicit.” Tourism researchers tend to work “within the specific boundaries of the main discipline in which they have been trained. Existing tourism theory is thus fragmented and weak.” (Echtner & Jamal, 1997, p. 868). Belhassen and Caton (2009, p. 335) argue for “a framework for exploring knowledge progression that includes the components of tourism morphology, or the creation and adjustment of concepts and models; the production and promotion of new interpretations and understandings; and the employment of such interpretations for the purpose of problem solving oriented to the needs of practitioners and policymakers”. Tourism is not alone in recognising dilemmas in its approaches and in seeking to establish stronger academic foundations (see for example Westbrook, 2008 discussing problems for ethnography). Development, even change in research is not new, as Holmes, (2008, p. 468) points out; science is now “starting to look back and rediscover its beginnings. but perhaps most important. is a changing appreciation of how scientists themselves fit into a society, and the nature of the particular creativity they bring to it.” In contrast to the natural sciences which seek to explain natural events and their causes “work in the humanities and qualitative social inquiry aims primarily at description (above all at thick description), at an understanding of meaning or (as it is often rather oddly put) of meanings, but eschews normative claims. It seeks to discover, articulate or analyse how the world has been represented in one or another text, image, discourse. or what is now called identity (and used, less confusedly, be spoken of as sense of identity). It therefore sees normative claims as legitimate, indeed important, objects of study, but not as its proper aim (O’Neill, 2009, p. 220, italics in original). Philosophical Issues in Tourism consists of 16 chapters contributed by a total of 21 authors, and is presented in 4 Parts. Part 1 is John Tribe’s Editorial introduction, mainly providing a concise overview of the ensuing chapters. It should be read by everyone using this book. Part 2 Truth: Reality, Knowledge and Disciplines is an attempt to “place the process of tourism knowledge production under scrutiny and to consider more carefully what it means to know” (p. 6). This explores “the conceptualisations and problematiques of the terms tourists and tourism” (p. 6), it also considers the production of knowledge about tourism, post-disciplinarity epistemology, and the benefits of adopting the wider framing offered by mobility. The five chapters in Part 2 examine Who is a Tourist? Conceptual and Theoretical Development; What is Tourism? Definitions, Theoretical Phases and Principals; Epistemology, Ontology and Tourism; Post-disciplinary Tourism; and The End of Tourism? Nomadology and the Mobilities Paradigm.
Book Reviews / Tourism Management 32 (2011) 957–962
Part 3 Beauty, Wellbeing, Aesthetics and Art considers “the contribution of tourism to individual wellbeing and spirituality” (p. 10). The five chapters in this section cover Tourism and Restoration; Aesthetic Pleasures: Contemplating Spiritual Tourism; Nature Beauty and Tourism; Tourism and the Aesthetic of the Built Environment; and Tourism and the Arts. Part 4 “engages with the concept of virtue in tourism. Virtue signifies moral excellence and goodness and belongs with ethics in the branch of philosophy that analyses values, right conduct and considers the meaning of the good life (p. 16). The five chapters are Ethics and Tourism; Good Actions in Tourism; Against ‘Ethical Tourism’; Development and its Discontents: Ego-tripping without Ethics or Idea(l)s?; and the book concludes with a chapter entitled Transmodernity: Remaking our (Tourism) World? (brackets above in the original). I have some criticisms of this otherwise excellent book. Firstly, it will be evident to most of my colleagues that an informed and comprehensive treatment of philosophical issues in tourism is an important and timely contribution to the continuing development of tourism studies. But it seems to me that the length constraint (300 pages, presumably imposed by the Publisher) does not allow the editor to do full justice to the importance, complexity, range and challenge of his subject. Contemplating spiritual tourism Singh and Singh (chapter 8) include a succinct overview of philosophical issues for non-western cultures, but where are the chapters, for example, on the rather different Asiatic philosophical stances towards tourism, or concerning their research values and traditions of scholarship? Also absent from this compendium is a full and vigorous discussion of the limitations of traditional Western mechanistic and comparative-static thinking (still too apparent in much tourism writing, in my opinion). Nor does it deal adequately with the significance of equifinality in analysing and understanding complex, evolving and indeterminate social systems. My second criticism is that this book and its readers would really benefit from more by the Editor, particularly in the form of a Conclusion. John Tribe is an ideal Editor for a book on this subject, his own scholarship and his position as Editor of Annals of Tourism Research gives him the authority to present his own understanding and views in much more detail than appears in this book. If this book goes into a second edition, as it deserves to, I urge the publisher to provide space for at least a full concluding chapter by John. Philosophical Issues in Tourism might well succeed in widening our informal and formal discussions (discourses?) to embrace not just what we study, but the ways in which our knowledge is advancing. Beyond what is explicit, I detect some themes woven through the chapters which perhaps make for uncomfortable reading: Why is a shared definition of tourism and tourists so elusive? Is the study of tourism necessarily dependant on the main disciplines from which it is developing, and if so, which are the more relevant? Why is the study of tourism relatively disregarded by academic managers? What has, or will, tourism contribute to other disciplines? Is the positivistic purpose of much tourism research evidence of a weakly theorised field of study? Will it be helpful to be more explicit about the fuzziness of many of our concepts, the vagueness of some of our methodologies, and to recognise that tourism is a complex, evolving and indeterminate social system? Is tourism the appropriate scale of enquiry, or should we be concerned with broader human issues such as mobilities? What, in fact, is distinctive about tourism as an individual, social and economic activity?
959
Akiyora, in Chapter 4 (p. 75) seems best to sum up the benefits of the book by pointing out that “a thorough reflection on various ontological and epistemological perspectives can serve to situate the enquiry into a proper philosophical context in the process of knowledge construction. This is important because it is not uncommon for those in the tourism academe to be challenged to defend their subject matter in different environments.” Despite some strictures, I congratulate John Tribe for his initiative, and I applaud Channel View for publishing Philosophical Issues in Tourism. John Tribe and the 21 contributors to this book challenge us all to take a measured look at the meaning, extent and significance of the study of tourism. Taken together, the 16 chapters in Philosophical Issues in Tourism provide an extensive, if not fully comprehensive reader for the more critical understanding of what it means to study tourism in the early part of the Twenty first century. Each chapter can be taken separately, and many will probably come to be recommended selectively on post graduate courses, or for the most advanced undergraduates. But lecturers and research students will benefit from reading the book as a whole. References Belhassen, Y., & Caton, K. (2009). Advancing understandings: a linguistic approach to tourism epistemology. Annals of Tourism Research, 36(2), 335–352. Botterill, D. (2001). The epistemology of a set of tourism studies. Leisure Studies, 20 (3), 199–214. Echtner, C., & Jamal, T. (1997). The disciplinary dilemma of tourism studies. Annals of Tourism Research, 24(4), 868–883. Holmes, R. (2008). The age of wonder: How the romantic generation discovered the beauty and terror of science. London: Harper Press. O’Neill, O. (2009). Applied ethics: naturalism, normativity and public policy. Journal of Applied Philosophy, 26(3), 219–230. Westbrook, D. (2008). Navigators of the contemporary: Why ethnography matters. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Eric Laws James Cook University, Cairns, Australia E-mail address: [email protected] doi:10.1016/j.tourman.2010.05.002
Marketing Innovations for Sustainable Destinations, Alan Fyal, Metin Kozak, Luisa Andreu, Juergen Gnoth, Sonja Sibila Lebe (Eds.). Goodfellow Publishing, Oxford (2009). p. 334, ISBN: 9781-906884-05-5 Marketing innovations for sustainable destinations is a compilation of 25 papers presented at the 3rd Advances in Tourism Marketing Conference (ATMC 2009) held in Bournemouth, UK in September 2009. In the chapter that follows the introduction, the papers are divided into three themes: consumer decision making and tourist experience; destination image, positioning and branding; and destination stakeholders and networks. Each part contains 11, 9 and 5 related articles respectively by a variety of authors. This book discusses core marketing topics from an international perspective, providing theoretical, practical and application issues of consumer behavior and marketing which can be simultaneously useful to academic researchers, policy makers and practitioners. A variety of study sites, from mainstream to peripheral destinations and from the West to the East, is a definite advantage of this book. Evidence of marketing innovations that the title of this book indicates can be found from resourceful and diverse study sites and contexts. In addition, data analyses adopted both quantitative and qualitative methods, although the former is more prevalent, added