The aim of this research was to understand why some young talented dancers stay in dance training while others decide to leave. In order to meet this aim, commitment, adherence and dropout among young talented dancers was investigated in five studies using a multidisciplinary mixed methods design. Participants were from eight of the UK Centres for Advanced Training (CATs) in Dance, nationwide talent development schemes that provide high quality part-time training to young people aged 10-18 years. The first study was a review of the literature on talent identification and development in order to understand the nature of the cohort and the type of environment in which the young people trained. The second study investigated multidisciplinary characteristics of 334 students to gain a descriptive understanding of the participants. Thirdly, nineteen committed students were interviewed to understand their experiences in dance and reasons for staying in training from their own perspectives. In the fourth study, ten students who had dropped out from a CAT were interviewed about their experiences and reasons for leaving; this data was triangulated using demographic information gathered from the CATs. Finally, a set of multidisciplinary characteristics was used to predict adherence to the CATs in the fifth study (N = 287). Results revealed that commitment to the CATs was underpinned by enjoyment, social relationships with peers and teachers, the opportunities available on the scheme and parental support. Adherence was positively predicted by harmonious passion, a love of dance characterised by a flexible type of involvement, and negatively by ego-involving motivational climate perceptions. This means that students were less likely to stay in training if they perceived their learning environment to emphasise other-referenced learning, competition among peers, objective success and punishment of mistakes. The main reasons for dropping out of the scheme according to the participants were having conflicting demands, change in aspirations, course content, difficulty making friends, and lost passion. Injury, financial factors, low perceived competence, and teacher behaviour emerged as minor reasons. Younger students were more likely to cite course-related reasons for dropping out than older students, while older students were more likely to cite change in aspirations and lost passion than their younger counterparts. Although participants were involved in a talent development scheme, aspects of physical competence, as identified in the first literature review study, did not appear influential in adherence and dropout. Overall these studies address a complex and under-researched area in dance. Results indicate that commitment can be maintained or enhanced by maximising enjoyment and passion, minimising elements of ego-involving motivational climates, facilitating positive peer relationships, ensuring training incorporates appropriate challenge and encouraging parental support.

Concern for the degradation of the environment has seen the emergence of a small but steadily increasing number of UK organisations. These organisations bring together paying volunteers and research projects to support sustainable development, which has given rise to an emerging niche within the sustainable tourism framework - Research Tourism. The study evaluates the dynamics between the organisations (Research Tourism Sector) and its customers (Research Volunteers). Independent studies were conducted of both the organisations and the volunteers. Seventy six interviews with research volunteers were undertaken and a survey was used for the organisations in the research tourism sector. The survey of organisations used a SPACE Analysis distributed to fifteen companies, of which nine were returned. The findings of the study on research volunteer's captures the socio-demographic profile that indicates sixty percent of the research volunteers are British, mainly single and are either currently studying or had previously studies at university. It continues by identifying a volunteer typology indicating three different types of volunteers and finally, a conceptual framework (research tourism systems model) which displays the components of travel in the sector. At the same time the analysis of the business environment suggests that the SPACE factors are not strong enough to depress profits and, therefore, the balance sheets should be healthy. The financial analysis suggests that this is not always the case. Organisations recognise that relying on volunteers' contributions could make them vulnerable and a growing number of alternatives are identified. It is argued that the sector has the potential to delivery the sustainable development agenda in terms of capacity building, policy advice and knowledge management the extent to which individual organisations deliver these concepts varies. Consequently, the 'sustainable difference' that the organisations in the research volunteer sector requires more consistent implication and therefore greater levels of monitoring. Evaluation of the dynamics between the organisations and colunteers identifies eight interrelated items. The framework of a spider's web demonstrates that when one dynamic is exposed, reverberations across all eight are inevitable. A connection between the eight dynamics and the volunteer typology indicate an even greater complexity. Further, when the strategic implications of the volunteer typologies were examined, it was found that the two discrete segments, Sepcific Research Volunteers and Corporate Research Volunteers, are not any more lucrative than the General Research Volunteer. The specialisation of these segments has largely come about through monopolisation of a particular funding source rather than the derivation of unique product offering. The thesis argues that a symbiotic relationship exists between the organisations and volunteers, in that volunteers contribute money that normally might not be spent on sustainability. However, this funding source is contingent on meeting a variety of non profit based criteria. This study is a contribution to the literature on volunteer tourism and further research directions are identified.

The aim of this doctoral thesis was to gain insight into ethical and responsible tourists, to understand their motivational values and to reveal the importance of these values in their holiday choice behaviour. This study has more than achieved this aim and makes unique contributions in several areas – not only has it extended what is known and understood about ethical and responsible tourist’s motivation but it has also underlined the utility of the values concept to understand their holiday choice behaviour. Further contribution derives from the application of the conceptual framework of the means-end chain theory (Gutman, 1982), which has enabled this study to explore the linkages between ethical and responsible tourists’ holiday choices, the perceived benefits of these choices and their underpinning values. This study has also found that, although useful, Schwartz’s (1992) value theory needs further modification if used within an ethical consumer context. Most notably, limitations have been found in the value types of power, achievement and hedonism when applied to ethical and responsible tourists’ holiday choice behaviour. Overall, this doctoral thesis has significantly advanced the tourist research agenda, not only by revealing the meaningful associations between ethical and responsible tourists’ values and their holiday choice behaviour, but also by providing crucial information on the specific values that prompt these holiday choices. From the key findings of this study, ethical and responsible tourists prefer to travel independently, perceive tourism to have the capacity to encourage inequitable relationships and understand how the tourism industry operates. They demonstrate sympathy for the principles of fair trade, with its emphasis on cooperation and partnership, and not only do they take active responsibility for sharing the economic benefits of their holidays they also want to make a lasting contribution to visited communities. Ethical and responsible tourists have a strong belief in their personal ability to facilitate change, not only by sharing their knowledge and experiences with family and friends but also because they believe their behaviour can demonstrate to others how to take an ethical or responsible approach to holiday choice. In addition, ethical and responsible tourists demonstrate a range of deeply held values including respect, responsibility and a duty of care towards both the planet and other people, the importance of sharing the economic benefits of tourism and a preoccupation with making sure their holiday choices are consistent with the values of equity, fairness and social justice.

By first detailing the religious, cultural and sporting heritage of Punjabi-Sikhs, the study focuses on how this sporting legacy of has been translated in Britain and how such translation has served to augment the perceived cultural traditions of British Punjabi-Sikhs. The inception of the Shaheedi Games tournaments and the proliferation of all-Punjabi-Sikh football teams are located within the wider phenomenon of post-war South Asian immigration to Britain. The first-hand oral testimonies of pioneering Punjabi-Sikh immigrants serve to script the narrative of the history and evolution of these tournaments. This work is also ethnographically informed through my association/interaction with a Punjabi-Sikh football club. The players/affiliates of this club provided a research environment and subject base allowing the investigation of their manifold identification with sport. The subjects of playing football and supporting professional football teams, along with the conspicuous absence of South Asians from top-flight professional football are used to highlight issues of racism(s) and the (re)negotiations of ethnic, cultural and regional identities. The Shadeedi Games tournaments are unique Punjabi-Sikh sporting/cultural events that have profound significance for Punjabi-Sikhs. The themes/principles of the carnival inform the discussion/exposition of these tournaments and point to their assumed counter-cultural motifs. This thesis aims to disavow uncritical conjecture that denies South Asians a diverse and prominent sporting pedigree/prowess. By uncovering and exploring the Punjabi-Sikh history and experience of sport, this thesis illustrates how this specific British South Asian community has an established, accomplished and multifariously dynamic identification with sport.

Merleau-Ponty suggests that a non-dualistic understanding of embodied being must start from a theory of embodied practice. This allows us to think in terms of a body-subject, rather than seeing the body as object, and thus to consider embodiment as the basis of subjectivity and intersubjectivity. Further to this, I contend that if we are to truly move away from dualism in our understanding of human being, we need not only to conceptualise embodiment adequately in philosophical terms, but also to engage with lived embodied practice. This thesis ‘fleshes out’ embodiment theory through an approach which brings Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy into conversation with the experiential accounts of professional contemporary dance practitioners, accessed through in-depth qualitative interviews. In bringing together a philosophy (Merleau-Ponty) which is rooted in the notion of embodied practice, and an embodied practice (contemporary dance) which both grounds and is grounded in philosophically interesting themes such as subjectivity, identity, intersubjectivity, expression and communication, this conversational method allows mutual illumination and opens up a new conceptual space for the exploration of the embodied basis of being. This project therefore emphasises the seeking out of links and common ground between the two interlocutors rather than offering a reductive critique. The conversation between philosophy and practice covers four main areas where the dancers’ reflections on their (embodied capacities for) practical knowledge, subjectivity, intersubjectivity, and representation are explored in relation to Merleau-Ponty’s conceptualisations of the corporeal schema, intercorporeality and flesh [la chair]. It is argued that this conversational approach functions to open up a space which lies in-between the traditional dualisms of mind and body, philosophy and practice, and theory and data, and allows me to develop and explore new ideas, connections, perspectives and understandings of the embodied basis of being that a different methodological approach would not have facilitated to the same extent.

This thesis explores the current trend for pole dancing as an increasingly popular fitness activity for women, taught in health and fitness clubs across the country. With the use of participant observation in classes and in-depth qualitative interviews with women who take these classes, as well as women who teach them, I explore what these types of class mean to these women, how pole dancing classes fit into contemporary feminist debates around the nature of and the future of feminism, and the pressures and expectations placed upon women to look and act in a feminine and sexualised way. Moving beyond what I see as the quite limiting previous accounts of these classes, which have debated whether or not they are empowering or degrading for women, my research suggests that pole dancing classes are complex, may be neither empowering nor degrading, for these concepts are complicated and problematic, and that the pole dancer cannot be seen as one dimensional. Women describe their participation in pole classes in a discourse of choice and control yet I show that their choice to participate is constructed somewhat by the media and the advertising of these classes which presents them as enabling women to create a particular desirable feminine and sexy self, perpetuated throughout our culture as the 'ideal'. Exploring the ways in which women attempt to manage impressions of themselves and present themselves as ‘respectable’, examine how the women in this study wish to dis-identify with both women who work as strippers and women who are feminist, seeing both identities as contradictory to the feminine image that they pursue. I explore the capacity of these classes to offer women feelings of agency, in particular through the fun, fitness and friendships that women gain from classes, but I challenge the idea that participating in pole dancing can offer empowerment, arguing that ultimately we can view these women's participation in terms of both their active engagement and enjoyment of these classes and in terms of the structures and pressures which continue to shape their lives.

The research in Talent Identification and Development (TID) in sport comprises a wide literature that is categorised into five key constructs in the second study of this thesis. The fifth construct concerns the role that the stakeholders (the sport organisation, coaches and parents) have in athlete development. However, this construct has attracted less research attention, despite its obvious and important contribution to athlete success. The second study indicated low degrees of stakeholder understanding of all five constructs of TID and poor levels of coherence between them, (as described by their perception of each other’s views of the research constructs). Further investigation endorsed this lack of coherence, and suggested specific areas of knowledge that would be helpful for coaches and parents in particular. There were very apparent perceptual differences between what parents wanted to know and what coaches thought they should know. Subsequently, testing the impact of parent workshops gave a clear indication that such an intervention could increase understanding of the key issues of athlete development and lead to improvement in coach-parent relationships. The different studies were based primarily in the UK and in one sport, but cultural differences suggest that the findings of this thesis may not pertain to other sports and nations. To this end, the final study compared TID systems and coach- parent coherence in three different cultures. Very few significant differences existed either in each nation’s TID process or in coach-parent coherence, suggesting a substantial influence of sporting over national culture. The conclusion is that the many and consistent outcomes of TID research are largely ignored by sport systems. Where TID processes are put in place for junior athletes by sport systems, they appear to contribute to low levels of coherence between the stakeholders and to the lack of success, as adults, of selected junior athletes.

Britain is widely considered to be the birth place of modern sport. Given this fact, it could be expected that the representation of sport within British museums would be extensive. However, the discussion of sport in museums within the existing literature is limited at best and, where it does occur, has a focus primarily on sport specific museums. Therefore, this thesis examines the development of sport in museums and the motivations and barriers which have influenced its development. Placing sport in museums within the wider context of cultural policy between the period of 1997 and 2012, the study explores the impact of sport in museums within wider social and economic agendas. Due to the lack of existing evidence concerning the subject area, the study draws on extensive fieldwork conducted by the author with individuals working in the fields of cultural policy, museum practice, and academia. In addition, focus groups and questionnaires were carried out with members of the public to ascertain perceptions towards sport as a subject matter for museums and the potential of sport to increase and change museum audiences. In addition, there is an in-depth evaluation of the Our Sporting Life exhibition programme in order to establish the impact of sport in museum against the widely used museu-m methodology frameworks, the Generic Learning *Outcomes and Generic Social Outcomes. The findings of this research demonstrate that sport in museums responds to a range of wider cultural policy objectives which support economic and social outcomes. These include: improving individual’s knowledge and understanding; providing enjoyment; supporting health and well-being agendas; and building stronger communities. In addition, the evidence establishes that sport attracts new and different audiences to museums and suggests that this may impact on the visiting habits of these individuals in the long-term. However, the findings also demonstrate that there are significant barriers to the delivery of sporting exhibitions in museums, most notably access to sufficient funding and inadequate knowledge and availability of relevant sporting collections. Therefore, this thesis presents the first conclusive evidence that sport in museums is both relevant and valuable as a subject matter for museum discourse, and argues that this alone suggests a need for increased funding to support further development of activity in this field.

Over the last two decades, the concept of dark tourism has attracted ever-increasing attention in both academic and media circles. At the same time, not only has there been an apparent growth in the supply of ‘dark’ tourism sites and attractions, but also such demand for dark tourism experiences is also evidently on the increase. Hence, academic research has and continues to be concerned with both the consumption (demand) and development (supply) of dark tourism sites and experiences, reflected in a now extensive and diverse dark tourism literature. Nevertheless, significant issues with respect to dark tourism remain unresolved, not least the validity of the term itself. That is, dark tourism is considered by some to be a pejorative term, particularly in the context of the tourist experience. However, of greater concern is the lack of attention paid to the role of local communities in dark tourism destinations. In other words, there is limited understanding of how local communities respond to becoming the object of the dark tourist ‘gaze’, and the subsequent implications for the development and management of tourism in ‘dark’ destinations. The purpose of thesis, therefore, is to address the gap in the literature. Based on a case study of L’Aquila, a city in Italy that in 2009 was struck by a powerful and deadly earthquake and that subsequently became (and continues to be) a new dark tourism destination, it sets out to explore how ‘dark’ tourism has evolved and, in particular, the local community’s understanding of and responses to their city becoming a dark tourism destination as a result of the disaster it suffered. More specifically, in order to address these issues, the thesis focuses initially on relevant background theory, including a critical review of both the emergence of the concept of dark tourism and its wider application within the field of tourism studies and contemporary theory of host-tourist perceptions. Subsequently, the formal literature review explores critically contemporary approaches to theorising disasters, the disaster recovery process and disaster tourism, as well as broader theoretical constructs relating to the social construction of reality. Collectively, these inform the construction of two conceptual frameworks which are subsequently applied to guide two stages of empirical enquiry. The research in L’Aquila reveals that, overall there has been a lack of any significant guidance or leadership in tourism development within the city. As a consequence, the city has in effect become an unplanned open museum for tourists, whilst the residents themselves feel betrayed by the authorities for the lack of progress in the redevelopment of their city and feel exploited and or treated with a lack of understanding and respect by tourists who come to gaze on their misfortune. Thus, it is argued that a more recognised and established tourism presence on behalf of the local community might have ensured that the conduct of tourists was effectively controlled and managed, thereby reducing the negative impacts of tourism on the local community. That is, it is suggested that, had the local community been better placed to manage the influx of ‘dark’ tourists into their city, they would have been more accepting of tourism and tourists in the initial stages of tourism development following the disaster. Consequently, through a combination of stakeholder development theory and the empirical data generated by this research, the thesis proposes a ‘Post-disaster tourism development stakeholder model’. Of most significance, however, is the manner in which the city’s social and cultural environment has limited the individual and the collective attitude amongst the local community in L’Aquila towards tourism and tourists; that is, it is identified that L’Aquila’s collective social mentality has been a major barrier to the potential development of tourism since the disaster. With respect to the concept of dark tourism in particular, the research reveals that for, the local community in L’Aquila, tourism since the earthquake is best defined or thought of not as ‘dark tourism’ but as disaster tourism. Indeed, it became evident through the research that the labelling of L’Aquila as ‘dark’ not only stigmatised the location and the victims of the earthquake but, importantly, also influenced the residents’ perceptions of tourists. That is, tourists are seen as ‘dark’ by the local residents, heightening negative feelings towards them and consequently, reinforcing the unwillingness of many members of the community to support or engage in promoting dark tourism. Additionally, the research found that local residents experienced higher levels of negative emotions towards tourists in the initial stages following the disaster. Of significance, is that, over time, the local residents have become more willing to accept tourism and tourists who are engaging with ‘dark’ tourism practices relating to the earthquake that destroyed their city. This temporal element is recognised and proposed in a ‘Host-Reactions to Post-Disaster Tourists / Tourism Model’. This thesis also proposes a more rounded perspective of host-tourist attitudes to dark tourism, focusing on the individual attitude of a local, rather than that of a collective societal position. Overall, then, this research reveals that there are significant and varied implications in the development of dark tourism from the perspective of the local community, not least with respect to the term 'dark tourism' itself. That is, dark tourism is shown to be an inappropriate label to attach to either the destination of tourists who visit, enhancing as it does the negative perceptions towards tourists whilst stigmatising the local community as victims. Thus, use of the term 'dark tourism' may be best restricted to academic contexts. Nevertheless, the attitude or perceptions of the local community to becoming the object of the 'dark' tourist gaze can only be fully comprehended within a wider analysis of the local socio-cultural environment and, in particular, the disaster recovery process. In this case study, the local community's perceptions of tourism are influenced by failures in the disaster recovery process and, hence, the proposed frameworks offer a valid basis for future research in alternative dark or disaster tourism contexts.

Globally, the provision of accommodation is dominated by family run businesses (Getz and Carlsen, 2005). Family businesses in the tourism and hospitality industry are significant in terms of numbers, economic value, and longevity. The visions and goals of the owners are different from those of other entrepreneurs, in the tourism and hospitality industry (Carland, Hoy, Boulton and Carland, 1984). However, scant academic research on family run hotels has been published. Since 1980 service quality has been a significant issue within tourism and hospitality, following the pattern set by the manufacturing industries (Johns, 1996). Hayes, Ninemeier and Miller (2011) argued that service quality is an important factor in customers’ perceived experience of hotel operations; thus, a better understanding of customer expectations within tourism and hospitality is potentially valuable for both practitioners and researchers. This is particularly true in Thailand, where tourism is a primary source of national income. Therefore, the overall aim of this research project is to develop a quality assurance model enabling Thai family run hotels to identify strengths and opportunities to improve their practices aligned with their motivations. Phase One of the research critically appraised the visions and goals of Chiangmai family run hotels. Phase Two examined the business environment of the hotels in terms of the implementation of quality assurance principles. In order to ascertain their customer expectations, Phase Three comprised of administering modified SERVQUAL questionnaire to their international guests. The results to the first phase revealed that family run businesses dominate the hotel sector in Chiangmai. These enterprises are motivated by three factors: lifestyle, concerning with their descendants, and keeping the business modest. Phase Two data identified a low level of quality assurance engagement in these family run hotels. Based on their own perceptions of the quality required, these hotel operators employ an inside-out approach; they design and communicate service specification via social media without investigating customer expectations. The findings from Phase Three showed that the dimension of “Competitiveness” is the most important. The thesis findings enabled the researcher to develop a generic model of quality assurance for family run hotels contributing to the body of knowledge.