No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

During the last 100 years, commercial aviation has developed into an established mode of transportation serving millions of passengers every year, but while researchers from other disciplines - most notably sociology, cultui-al history, and anthropology - have begun to appreciate the multiple dimensions of flight, geographers have written surprisingly little on the subject beyond quantitative analyses of airline networks. While perhaps understandable given the present geopolitical climate of passenger (in)security and commercial confidentiality, this nevertheless means many of the industry's significant facets have yet to be adequately charted. Considering geography's rich heritage of examining space, place, and spatial phenomena at a variety of scales, this thesis provides a distinctive contribution to theoretical and empirical knowledge by addressing the multiple geographies of airspace. Set in the context of the ongoing controversy surrounding the reorganisation offlightpaths at Nottingham East Midlands Airport (NEMA) in the United Kingdom, it considers the inherently geographical and often contested nature of airspace production. By detailing the complex interplay between how airspace is produced 'on the ground' by those who oppose its use, and 'in the air' by Air Traffic Controllers and airline pilots, it offers a new perspective for studies of geography and air transport in an age of mass aeromobility.

This thesis investigates a tourist segment which has been created out of Ulrich Beck's Risk Society (1989, 2010). These travellers have been dubbed 'Risk Society Travellers'. The outcomes of this study introduce concepts that characterise the Risk Society Travellers. The 'Risk Society Traveller Bubble' is the main concept and contribution to knowledge. It is a multilayered bubble that encapsulates all travellers within a bubble of familiarity and therefore safety and security whilst travelling to a post crisis destination, thereby deepening our understanding of such travellers. The thesis follows Beck's arguments of a society in which everyday life is increasingly governed by risks that have become incalculable, uncompensatable, unlimited, unaccountable and, most important of all, invisible to our senses. The contention is that people live with permanent non-knowing or with the simultaneity of threats and non-knowing and cannot grasp which concerns one should have and in what situations. These problems of risk and uncertainty pose dilemmas for us all (Myth en and Walklate, 2006). The notions that have been discussed in the literature investigate the nature of the tourism experience which this study is trying to connect to crises tourism in order to gain further understanding of the people that travel to such destinations. During the current times of crisis, in which headlines of terror and catastrophes are predominant in the media, each and everyone of us still has to make choices, whether to travel and where to travel. The theoretical development in tourism suggests that catastrophes, such as terrorism and natural disasters impact negatively on tourists' perception of a destination and therefore have a negative impact on the demand for such destinations. However, tourism numbers are still rising and are forecasted to rise in the future (WTO, 2010). This thesis sheds light on the travellers within today's risk society and investigates the tourists visiting destinations post- crisis. The study therefore introduces a research framework for investigating Risk Society Travellers. By implementing the developed methodology, attributes of this segment have been identified which facilitate the further establishment of the 'theory of the Risk Society Traveller'. It may also be suggested that the theoretical development of these tourists has largely remained undeveloped. Therefore tourism concepts from the literature have been brought together in order to create an outset for investigating the Risk Society Traveller. As a culturalist interpretation, this research project therefore attempts to 'show at least a bit of the terrible, but ultimately hopeful, complexity of life in a society whose reality is often oversimplified' (Farrell, 1986). By introducing a research framework for a novel interpretation of the contemporary traveller, an original contribution to knowledge has been made. Through testing the research framework insights into what influences this segment then potentially contributes to the existing body of knowledge.

This research centres on an artistic exploration of ethnographic methodologies whilst investigating tourist performativity and the presentation of self within tourist documentation. Central to this presentation is the performance of the documented smile. The materiality of this research comes from documentary evidence (video, sound, photography, interviews, fieldnotes and diaries) recorded during a fieldtrip around popular tourist destinations in Europe. Data gathering methods, such as participant observation, reflexive writing and informal interviews with tourists, were employed not just to capture the tourist experience of others, but also to explore the multiplicity and variability of the researcher self within the field. The representation of the researcher within the research findings has become one of the issues that this project has sought to address. Two practical outputs, a primary case study entitled Smile: Formaggio con Queso (a randomly configuring computer networked installation) and a secondary case study (an interactive kiosk), interface a database constructed from the field data. Both case studies support research into how ethnographic methods might be used to inform the production processes of an art project, and, additionally, how digital art practice might contribute to the presentation of post-paradigm ethnography. The practical issues of data collecting and the implications of using the self as part of the data source are highlighted. This will be of interest to artists working in field environments where the self and 'other' is synonymous. Furthermore, the primary case study challenges conventional representational ethnographic modes in order to facilitate new kinds of qualitative and ethnographic insights. A reflexive autoethnographic approach to writing the thesis has been utilised to validate my personal narrative as a line of inquiry.

The purpose of this study is to explore the contemporary social phenomenon of soft ASB in tourism, specifically in Andalucia, Spain. A series of observations, interviews with tourists and hosts and focus groups were conducted during the period of two tourist seasons. The aim was to establish the types of ASB exhibited by UK leisure tourists and to explore the reasons for the ASB exhibited. A qualitative approach to research was adopted and data were analysed and interpreted following the constant comparison method. Findings show that soft ASB exists in Andalucia. However, tourist and host perceptions of ASB were different. For the tourists ASB focused on the drinking culture of the UK leisure tourist. For the host ASB constituted reluctance by the British to embrace Spanish culture demonstrated through, for example, a preference by the tourist to consume British style food rather than Spanish. ASB is notoriously difficult to define and to date has not been defined in tourism. For this study a fresh definition has been created based on the findings of this study. This has taken into account the broader context of ASB and the reasons for ASB. This study has developed a framework that establishes management responses to and management implications of ASB in a cross-cultural tourism context and which suggests a practical and theoretical approach to ASB. Whist the findings are not considered to be generalisable the framework and qualitative research approach could be adopted for investigations into a range of tourist behaviour.

The aim of this thesis is to contribute theoretical development in the field of dark tourism, an academic field that has been introduced to tourism studies in recognition of the increasing human interest in exploring the dark side of our past (Lennon, 2010). To achieve this, an understanding of human motivation is used as the focus of this research. Moreover, this is placed in a non-Western, specifically Chinese, social context, which offers an exciting opportunity to explore both motivational differences and their underlying influences. This research adopts a relativist epistemology that emphasises the diversity of the environment in shaping the ways people know and experience the world. As a result, this research adopts an interdisciplinary approach that demands a unified philosophical basis, which leads to the development of an integrated conceptual framework. Using this conceptual framework, the research carefully mixes both quantitative and qualitative research through " deploying a case study approach focusing on the memorial to the victims of Nanjing Massacre. During the course of a four-month period of fieldwork 795 visitor questionnaires were completed and 50 semi-structured interviews were carried out. The research shows that visiting sites such as the Nanjing Massacre memorial is not driven by voyeurism, as has frequently been speculated, but rather is motivated by a strong desire to rationalise history and to achieve a suitable relationship between the self and the world, especially in the Chinese social context which has been undergoing swift modernisation. Furthermore, this research highlights one of the fundamental differences that characterise the Chinese society - her emphasis on interdependence and relationships whereas the ideas of independence and individuality are valued in the West.

This thesis investigates consumption from the perspective of morality. It looks at how fundamental aspects of morality are shaped by discourses of tourism consumption. The decision to examine consumption from a moral perspective was largely motivated by initial questions about the seemingly paradoxical nature of being a 'good' person and a 'good' consumer at the same time: one concept seemingly underpinned by a sense of responsibility and a regard for citizenship and humanity, whilst the other appears entrenched in a discourse of individualism, self-interest and free choice. The thesis continued to be motivated in this way, driven by the need to understand how the cultural texts produced for consumers about the products and services they consume, simultaneously shaped core aspects of morality such as choice and harm. How, for instance, was it possible that products and services known to be harmful to both society and the environment - e.g. cars, tourism, alcohol- could be interpreted as morally legitimacy and unproblematic? More specifically, what role do the texts produced for consumers, e.g. adverts, brochures, magazines etc, play in expressing the boundaries of morality in such situations? Moreover, in light of the rise in the number ofethically augmented products and services available, for example, in supermarkets, travel agents and banks, it seemed appropriate to consider the extent to which these ostensibly moral features of the market expressed aspects of morality in a meaningful sense of the word. The thesis begins with a 'search' for morality in the literature on consumption, finding that the notion of morality underpins a number of different areas of consumer research. In addition to morally explicit terminology such as consumer rights, ethical consumption and fair trade, a conception of morality is also reievan! to academic critiques of consumption, research into ritualistic behaviour such as gift-giving as well as studies of consumer values that define sets ofvirtuous practices for groups of consumers. The morality and consumption literature is found to comprise a number of different discussions that often assume, rather than explicitly expose, the notion of morality. The critical nature of the review exposes the nature and scope of morality as depicted within the various discussions whilst, at the same time, throwing light on the underlying motivations that drive a particular stream ofresearch. This exercise provides a picture of a broader conception of morality and consumption, calling for a reframing of morality as a discourse about right and wrong, good and evil. It is argued that discourse provides an appropriate framework for the study as it can suitably deal with the multiplicity evidenced in the concept of morality and its implicit application in the consumption literature. Following this, a discursive conception of morality through which to begin to interpret social processes of consumption is outlined. Acknowledged as the fundamental basis of research purporting to examine consumption from some kind of moral perspective, the notion morality is explored through a critical review of the mainstream literature on morality. Five dominant paradigmatic conceptions of morality are discerned from the mainstream disciplines ofphilosophy, psychology, sociology and economics. In this thesis each perspective is examined and their constituent elements deconstructed and tabularised giving rise to three basic moral themes relevant to an interpretation of consumption morality - harm, freedom and choice.

The launch of sustainable community based rural tourism (CBRT) programs in 1996 by the Ministry of Tourism of Malaysia (MOTOUR) indicated the government's commitment to incorporate sustainable development principles into the national tourism planning and development framework. Since then, the programs have been widely promoted by the government through various agencies and strongly embraced by the rural communities. Although the programs promise much potential such as job creations, provide an alternative of income for the rural household while promoting culture preservation and environment protection, recent studies showed that there was an issue of lack of monitoring of performance and progress of the programs due to the absence of criteria and indicators. From this research point of view, the absence of monitoring tools such as indicators could create obstacles and challenges, especially for the government and other donor agencies, in assessing the return on their investment in the programs and other impacts on the communities involved. Through extensive review of literature, a sufficient number of a preliminary list of criteria and indicators were identified. Each criteria and indicators were assigned into different category of sustainable CBRT namely economic, socio-cultural, environment and institutional. 64 preliminary indicators covered by eight criteria were identified by brought forward for the next stage: formulation of survey questionnaire. The identification and selection of a set of indicators using questionnaire survey was carried out using a Delphi exercise with experts and survey of local stakeholders. For the Delphi exercise, 20 experts were identified (academics, government officials, NGOs and tourism consultants) and consulted during the Stage One of Delphi consultation (selection of importa!lt indicators). However, due to the unavoidable issue of experts' dropout, a smaller number of 11 experts were maintained for Stage Two (ranking of indicators). The surveys of local stakeholders were carried out during the Stage Two involving 85 respondents from three selected villages as case studies (Le. Kuala Medang, Teluk Ketapang and Seterpa) located in the East Coast Economic Region (BCER). As a result, out of 64 indicators initially listed in the survey questionnaire, 47 indicators were selected both by the experts and by local stakeholders and included in the final list of indicators. The fieldwork results indicate that both the experts and local stakeholders are interested to support the idea of indicators formulation for monitoring the CBRT progress. At the final stage of the research, the proposed list of 47 indicators was put to test to assess the applicability and measurability of indicators for monitoring CBRT performances in the three villages i.e. Kuala Medang, Teluk Ketapang and Seterpa where 50 respondents participated in the survey. The field test intended to measure the uptake of sustainable economic, socio-cultural, environment and institution practices of CBRT program in all three villages. The outcomes for the analysis on uptake of CBRT economic and institution practices has shown a moderate success level with both 54% and 76% of an overall achievement while the analysis on uptake of CBRT socio-cultural and environment practices has shown a high success level with both 72% and 52% of an overall achievement. The field test revealed that the proposed indicators have been shown to be useful for measuring CBRT performance in the three case study villages. Furthermore, the achievement of CBR T practices could be determined as either low, or moderate or highly sustainable using index score approach. The results from quantitative and qualitative data collection processes could provide vital information to researchers, local hosts and other stakeholders about the current performance in the CBR T program from all major categories of indicators: economic, social-cultural, and environment and institution. In conclusion, the results from field test of indicators could inform decision makers and the CBRT participants in general about "where they are", i.e. based on the current level of sustainability practices, and "where they want to go", i.e. the local hosts' go~l or target setting for development of CBRT program. More importantly, indicators could also reveal to local hosts and other stakeholders "how far they are from achieving their goal/target".