The Routledge Handbook of Cultural Tourism

Greg Richards editor Melanie Smith editor

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Taylor & Francis Ltd

Published:21st Dec '12

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The Routledge Handbook of Cultural Tourism cover

The Routledge Handbook of Cultural Tourism explores and critically evaluates the debates and controversies in this field of Tourism. It brings together leading specialists from a range of disciplinary backgrounds and geographical regions, to provide state-of-the-art theoretical reflection and empirical research on this significant stream of tourism and its future direction.

The book is divided into 7 inter-related sections. Section 1 looks at the historical, philosophical and theoretical framework for cultural tourism. This section debates tourist autonomy role play, authenticity, imaginaries, cross-cultural issues and inter-disciplinarity Section 2 analyses the role that politics takes in cultural tourism. This section also looks at ways in which cultural tourism is used as a policy instrument for economic development. Section 3 focuses on social patterns and trends, such as the mobilities paradigm, performativity, reflexivity and traditional hospitality, as well as considering sensitive social issues such as dark tourism. Section 4 analyses community and development, exploring adaptive forms of cultural tourism, as well as more sustainble models for indigenous tourism development. Section 5 discusses Landscapes and Destinations, including the transformation of space into place, issues of authenticity in landscape, the transformation of urban and rural landscapes into tourism products and conservation versus development dilemmas. Section 6 refers to Regeneration and Planning, especially the creative turn in cultural tourism, which can be used to avoid problems of serial reproduction, standardisation and homogenisation. Section 7 deals with The Tourist and Visitor Experience, emphasising the desire of tourists to be more actively and interactively engaged in cultural tourism.

This significant volume offers the reader a comprehensive synthesis of this field, conveying the latest thinking and research. The text is international in focus, encouraging dialogue across disciplinary boundaries and areas of study and will be an invaluable resource for all those with an interest in Cultural Tourism.

This is essential reading for students, researchers and academics of Tourism as well as those of related studies in particular Cultural Studies, Leisure, Geography, Sociology, Politics and Economics.

The phenomenon of cultural tourism is vast and multidimensional. This sophisticated volume tackles and elucidates nearly every point of discussion and debate currently taking place in this important subfield of tourism studies. This superb compilation of essays is groundbreaking in its topical coverage and global scope. Its editors and contributing authors are among the brightest thinkers in the field, and this collection extends their intellectual influence even further. This handbook is an absolute necessity for all scholars who are interested in tourism and cultural studies.

— Professor Dallen J. Timothy, School of Community Resources and Development, Arizona State University, US

The editors should be commended on producing such an excellent handbook that addresses the key issues and challenges within cultural tourism today, involving established and emergent scholars in the field. It is not designed as an encyclopedia of cultural tourism but rather offers debate around a select number of topics which will be relevance to students, academics, policy makers, and practitioners interested in cultural tourism.

Professor Stephen Boyd, University of Ulster

Melanie Smith and Greg Richards' cultural tourism handbook is an impressive volume, featuring no fewer than 50 chapters on a variety of issues that range from calculating the economic impacts of cultural tourism, to exploring the visitor experience, to understanding how this phenomenom unfolds in the context of differnet land- and ethno-scapes... Highlights of the book are too numerous to fully mention...

— Kellee Caton, Thompson Rivers University, Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change

ISBN: 9780415523516

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: 926g

420 pages