This thesis is an empirical and theoretical investigation into the changing trends in place marketing as it relates to urban tourism, particularly in the city of Toronto. It begins by exploring broader discourses to do with capitalism and creativity and their impacts on city space and people’s interactions with it and within it. These perspectives are then situated in the Toronto context, a city that currently embraces the notion of the Creative City, as promulgated by Richard Florida, which encourages the branding of the city for the purpose of stimulated economic growth and in which tourism plays an increasing role. Thirdly, it examines the theoretical implications of the prominent belief that tourism and place marketing are imperative for Toronto’s economic well-being. Official efforts at place marketing and place branding construct what John Urry terms the tourist gaze, and frame the city in particular ways to particular people. Fourthly, this thesis gives an empirical account of how the gaze comes to bear on the physical city space in terms of infrastructure and financing projects in the interest of creating a Tourist City. The penultimate chapter brings to light how the rise of new media has allowed for the greater possibility to puncture the traditionally linear narrative of the city with new voices, thus fracturing the monolithic gaze in some instances. The thesis concludes by questioning the implications of new media on the existing systems of city management and promotion, recognizing the ambivalence of new media and its potential to both challenge and reproduce current discourse. / Thesis (Master, Cultural Studies) -- Queen's University, 2011-09-29 16:22:22.467

This thesis aims to explore and describe the images of China in the Western tourist material. There is much literature talking about images of China; however, among the existing scholarship so far few have investigated from the angle as we do. We use social constructivism and representation as main theories and combined with central concepts of the tourist gaze, stereotypes and the other, and post-colonialism and orientalism. Moreover, we conduct a case study by applying qualitative discourse analysis in order to find out the stereotypes and orientalist ideas of China depicted in the tourist material. The findings show that in the perspective of western tourist material, China is representative of the Orient. The analysis also concludes that China is seen as a country with 5,000-year civilization whose people have lots of virtues; a developing economic power; a not so democratic socialist country; a potential threat and a global actor with increasing influences. Our thesis contributes to the existing literature on China research and tourism research—marketing and political implications for its national image improvement and tourism development.

Filmturism är ett relativt nytt fenomen på turistmarknaden, som kort kan beskrivas med när en turist besöker en destination eller attraktion till följd av att destinationen/attraktionen har visats upp på tv eller i film. I Thailand har ett flertal stora filmer spelats in genom åren, bland annat The Beach och James Bond – The Man with the Golden Gun. Syftet med denna studie är att belysa fenomenet filmturism samt undersöka hur lokala aktörer i Thailand använder filmerna Beach och James Bond – Man with the golden gun som redskap för platsmarknadsföring och imageskapande. I studien har det även studerats hur destinationerna har påverkats av filmerna samt hur destinationerna uppfattas av turister som har varit eller är på väg till någon av platserna. Den destinationsimage som skapas genom film behöver inte alltid stämma överens med destinationens verkliga image. Studiens material har samlats in genom kvalitativa intervjuer, observationer och skuggningar samt kvantitativa enkäter och granskning av resesidan Tripadvisor och aktören Maya Bay Tours hemsida. Studiens resultat visar att filmerna har påverkat platsernas image och att Maya Bay inte är lika beroende av filmen i sin marknadsföring som James Bond Island är. Turister som har besökt platserna påpekade att mängden turister är det som förstört upplevelsen och att turismen måste regleras för att deras förväntningar ska uppfyllas.

Ekoturism är ett användbart begrepp dock inte särskilt väldefinierat. Det finns många olika förklaringar om begreppet, från preciserat till koncist. Eftersom turistbranschen är en av världens största industrier är det därför viktigt att utveckla det på ett hållbart sätt som gynnar miljön, lokalbefolkningen och ekonomin. Syftet med studien var att undersöka i vilken utsträckning Palawan arbetar med ekoturism samt vilken uppfattning turisterna har om begreppet. Insamlingsmetoden baserads på kvalitativa samtalsintervjuer med en semistrukturerad ansats. Studien visade på att respondenterna inte hade några kunskaper om begreppet ekoturism och kan därför inte agera på ett hållbart vis. Anledningen till att samtliga respondenter inte hade någon kunskap om ekoturism berodde på kunskapsbrist, däremot hade det ett miljömedvetet beteende. Slutsatsen visar på att det finns ett glapp mellan kunskap och handling inom ekoturism. Att driva ekoturism anses vara mer krävande än vanlig turism av den orsaken att det behövs både mer kunskap men också för att det är en kostnadsfråga, vilket är anledningen till att många destinationer väljer att inte göra det. Lyckligtvis har ekoturism blivit allt mer populärt genom åren och människan är idag betydligt mer medvetna om dagens miljöproblem. / Ecotourism is a useful concept, but not very well defined. As the tourism industry is one of the world's largest industries, it is therefore important to develop it in a sustainable way that benefits the environment, local people and the economy. The purpose with this thesis was to examine in what extent Palawan works with ecotourism and which perception the tourists has about the concept. The collection method was based at qualitative interviews. The thesis result showed that none of the respondents had any knowledge about the concept ecotourism and therefore can’t act in a sustainable manner. The reason why the respondents had no knowledge about the concept depended on lack of knowledge. The conclusion shows that there is a gap between knowledge and action within eco-tourism. Manage ecotourism is more demanding than regular tourism because of the needs for more knowledge, but also because it ́s a cost issue, which is why many destinations choose not to manage ecotourism. Fortunately, ecotourism has become increasingly popular over the years and man is today much more aware of today's environmental problems.

This paper is an inventory of the general motivations of Swedish film tourists. The paper is based on a quantitative research survey to gain insight from Swedish film tourists in the matter of what it is in movies that are motivating them to travel. The motivations behind film tourists visiting film destinations in a qualitative perspective, are storytelling, authenticity, film tourists gaze and fandom. By travelling to film destinations tourists takes part of magical tourism experiences. The paper has a deductive view point to the subject of film tourists and the results from the survey are collected from communities on Facebook called Harry Potter-fans in Sweden, Star Wars Sweden and The lord of the ring-fans in Sweden. The result from the survey shows that Swedish film tourists from these communities are motivated by the terms of storytelling, authenticity, film tourists gaze and fandom and that they are all experiencing something extraordinary when they travel because of movies. The motivations are also the foundation and the general aspect of travelling to film destinations, which either push or pull the film tourists towards the film destinations.

abstract: The emergence of social media in concert with improved camera and cell phone technologies has helped usher in an age of unprecedented visual communication which has radically changed the tourism industry worldwide. Serving as an important pillar of tourism and leisure studies, the concept of the tourist gaze has been left relatively unexamined within the context of this new visual world and more specifically image based social media. This phenomenological inquiry sought to explore how image based social media impacts the concept of the tourist gaze and furthermore to discover how the democratization of the gaze in concert with specific features of image based social media applications impacts the hermeneutic circle of the tourist gaze. This in-depth analysis of the user experience within the context of travel consisted of 19 semi-structured photo elicitation interviews and incorporated 57 participant generated photos. Six salient themes emerged from the study of this phenomenon; 1) sphere of influence, 2) exchange of information, 3) connections manifested, 4) impression management and content curation, 5) replicated travel photography, and 6) expectations. Analysis of these themes in conjunction with examples from the lived user experience demonstrate that the tourist gaze is being accelerated and expanded by image based social media in a rapid manner. Furthermore, democratization of the gaze as enabled by technological developments and specialized social media platforms is actively shifting the power role away from a small number of mass media influencers towards a larger number of branded individuals and social media influencers. Results of this inquiry support the theoretical assertions that the tourist gaze adapts to social and technological developments and demonstrates that the concept of the tourist gaze is increasingly important within tourism studies. Practical implications regarding the prevalence of real-time information, site visitation, and “taking only pictures” as sustainable touristic behavior are discussed. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Community Resources and Development 2019

Den globala turismnäringen har kommit att bli en av världens mest lukrativa branscher. Hundratusentals svenskar turistar i Thailand varje år. Vad representerar Thailand i turistens ögon? Hur ser turisten på sig själv i förhållande till det han/hon möter och hur förhåller sig turisten till det lokala och globala? Uppsatsen utgår från en kritisk hållning till fenomenet turism. Teorier om Postkolonialism och Orientalism samt kritisk turismforskning blir därmed centrala i förståelsen av det undersökta materialet. Materialet som studeras i uppsatsen innefattas av resdagboksinlägg från hemsidan Resdagboken.se. Som metod används den kritiska diskursanalysen. Materialet visar på vissa specifika teman; ”Det trygga äventyret”, ”Att inte vara som alla andra turister”, ”Sol, bad konsumtion och lättja”, ”Erotik”, samt ”Tilltalet till dem där hemma”. Genom belysandet av turismens bakomliggande strukturer och hur man genom det skrivna ordet uttrycker föreställningar om andra och sig själv, försöker författaren till uppsatsen bredda förståelsen för turismen som global företeelse.

<p>Den globala turismnäringen har kommit att bli en av världens mest lukrativa branscher. Hundratusentals svenskar turistar i Thailand varje år. Vad representerar Thailand i turistens ögon? Hur ser turisten på sig själv i förhållande till det han/hon möter och hur förhåller sig turisten till det lokala och globala? Uppsatsen utgår från en kritisk hållning till fenomenet turism. Teorier om Postkolonialism och Orientalism samt kritisk turismforskning blir därmed centrala i förståelsen av det undersökta materialet. Materialet som studeras i uppsatsen innefattas av resdagboksinlägg från hemsidan <em>Resdagboken.se</em>. Som metod används den kritiska diskursanalysen.</p><p>Materialet visar på vissa specifika teman; ”Det trygga äventyret”, ”Att inte vara som alla andra turister”, ”Sol, bad konsumtion och lättja”, ”Erotik”, samt ”Tilltalet till dem där hemma”. Genom belysandet av turismens bakomliggande strukturer och hur man genom det skrivna ordet uttrycker föreställningar om andra och sig själv, försöker författaren till uppsatsen bredda förståelsen för turismen som global företeelse.</p>

Photography and tourism have been developing in parallel with each other and leaving memories of the trip in photographs still remains as a significant part of traveling today. Tourist photograph is an effective tool to display the way tourists see the destination they visited. However, while there are studies regarding general relationships between photography and tourism, what tourists see and photograph in each destination has not yet profoundly been investigated.This study first investigates images of Kiruna, Sweden, utilized in its promotion as atourist destination to understand how it is expected to be perceived by tourists. Then these images are compared with tourist photographs to understand how they actually respond to this expectation.Also, this thesis aims to add a new perspective to the concept of ‘hermeneutic circle’ proposed by John Urry (1990). Specifically, it takes particular note of ‘nationality’ and ‘culture’, and focuses on two specific tourist groups in Kiruna, Japanese and German tourists, to investigate differences between these nationality groups in the way they perceive Kiruna as a tourist destination. In order to fulfill this aim, Volunteer Employed Photography (VEP) was applied and photographs they took in Kiruna were collected. In order to enrich the photographic data, semi-structured interviews were also conducted with each study participant.The results revealed that the study participants photographed subjects that were both appeared and not appeared in the promotional images of Kiruna. The study also revealed that there were certain differences between Japanese and German tourists in the way they perceived Kiruna and each nationality group has its own hermeneutic circle.

Food studies offers a powerful lens through which to consider the complexity of travel, given the ways in which food can bring multiple perspectives to the table. The merging of food studies with the well-established tradition of study abroad, then, provides a platform for incorporating critical thinking and fresh perspectives into the discourse surrounding study abroad. How does food studies abroad reflect the opportunities and reify the concerns posed by study abroad in general? I explore this topic through a case study of a University of Oregon food studies abroad program, Food and Culture in Italy, looking specifically at students’ motivations, on-site experience, and perceived outcomes. I employ the lenses of identity, consumption, and experiential learning to discuss the trends that emerge from the data and conclude with a series of recommendations for moving thoughtfully and critically forward with food studies abroad programming.