Michael O' Regan | Swansea University (original) (raw)

Papers by Michael O' Regan

Anthropological Journal of European Cultures, 2023

While ‘polycrisis’ was coined by a French theorist of complexity called Edgar Morin and his co-au... more While ‘polycrisis’ was coined by a French theorist of complexity called Edgar Morin and his co-author Anne Brigitte Kern (1999), the word was more recently popularised by the historian Adam Tooze (2022) to describe the interaction of disparate crises at once, in such ways that the overall impact far exceeds the sum of each part. The Covid-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the climate emergency, cryptocurrency price busts, democratic deficits, raging inflation, profound social inequality and austerity, spiralling energy costs and what has been dubbed a global crisis in mental health mean complex societies are facing an extended period of existential uncertainties. Mutually implicative, these crises of the past, present and possible future are interacting in such ways that bring volatility, complexity, ambiguity and uncertainty to societies and individuals, often in completely unforeseeable, unintended and unpredictable ways.

Channel View, 2023

This book presents new contributions in backpacking research from various disciplines, capturing ... more This book presents new contributions in backpacking research from various disciplines, capturing the diversity of backpacker contexts, motives and behaviours. It takes a fresh, critical and reflexive look at over 40 years of backpacking research and seeks to recentre backpacking research before introducing new perspectives on backpacking and global backpacker cultures from previously unexplored perspectives. The chapters examine contemporary backpacker culture and mobilities, and the value and worth of backpacking both for individuals seeking an alternative life course and transformation, and destinations and businesses who value their economic and cultural potential. The volume aims to make sense of current research in order to understand backpacking's future, and produce new directions for conceptual, theoretical and methodological development and future research. It will be useful for students and researchers in tourism, sociology and anthropology.

Leisure Studies, 2022

While changes in society continue to inform understandings of what leisure is and how it manifest... more While changes in society continue to inform understandings of what leisure is and how it manifests itself, the emergence of Chinese outbound tourists, with specific motivations, travel styles and leisure choices are having powerful impacts on multiple host destinations. While university campuses have long been marked as visitor attractions in China, this study explores the motivations and implications of outbound Chinese tourists visiting university campuses abroad for leisure. On site qualitative interviews took place with 25 fully independent Chinese tourists at three campuses in Seoul, South Korea and a campus in Chiang Mai, Thailand. The study results found that Chinese visitors mark specific university campuses as attractions and are motivated to visit because of their prestige, by novelty and exploration, emotion and nostalgia and learning and knowledge seeking. This study argues that campus tourism may be difficult to develop and manage as a well-defined product that meets the needs of Chinese tourists, university governors and university stakeholders. The study explores the implications for universities and recommends universities begin a critical evaluation of prestige markers and especially those markers present in the Chinese cultural, pop-culture and (social) media context, which may be counterproductive to the primary mission of universities.

Current Issues in Tourism, 2022

When the linguistic innovation and phrase overtourism was used in an online news report to descri... more When the linguistic innovation and phrase overtourism was used in an online news report to describe excessive tourism in Iceland in 2016, legacy and social media soon following with in-depth articles and visual representations of perceived excessive tourism in other locations around the world. Given the growing calls for action on overtourism, this study takes a social network analysis (SNA) approach, using a network analysis and visualization software package called NodeXL Pro, to better understand the 10,325 tweets which used the hashtag 'overtourism' between July 2013 and September 2020. By exploring central users, conversation starters, gatekeepers and influencers, the analysis indicates that an ad ¶ hoc network was built around #overtourism on twitter. The analysis indicates that this network is held together by a small number of experts, who play a key role in presenting, distributing and circulating information about this controversial topic. While the studies practical contribution is the use of NodeXL Pro for advanced social media network analysis, the findings also indicate that the ability of these experts to influence perceptions of overtourism inside and outside twitter will depend on whether it can engage broader publics as the tourism sector recovers from a global pandemic.

Tourism Review, 2022

Abstract Purpose As tourism destinations grapple with declines in tourist arrivals due to COVID-1... more Abstract
Purpose
As tourism destinations grapple with declines in tourist arrivals due to COVID-19 measures, scholarly debate on overtourism remains active, with discussions on solutions that could be enacted to contain the excessive regrowth of tourism and the return of “overtourism”. As social science holds an important role and responsibility to inform the debate on overtourism, this paper aims to understand overtourism by examining it as a discursive formation.

Design / methodology / approach
The paper explores recurring thematic threads in scholarly overtourism texts, given the phrases coherence as a nodal-point is partially held in place by a collective body of texts authored by a network of scholars who have invested in it. The paper uses interdiscursivity as an interpretive framework to identify overlapping thematic trajectories found in existing discourses.

Findings
Overtourism, as a discursive formation, determines what can and should be said about the self-evident “truths” of excessive tourist arrivals, the changes tourists bring to destinations and the range of discursive solutions available to manage or end overtourism. As the interpellation of these thematic threads into scholarly texts is based on a sense of crisis and urgency, the authors find that the themes contain rhetoric, arguments and metaphors that problematize tourists and construct them as objects in need of control and correction.

Originality / value
While the persistence of the discursive formation will be determined by the degree to which scholarly and other actors recognize themselves in it, this paper may enable overtourism scholars to become aware of the limits of their discursive domain and help them to expand the discourse or weave a new one.

We invite scholars to submit theoretical work, case studies and empirical research, for the purpo... more We invite scholars to submit theoretical work, case studies and empirical research, for the purpose of expanding our understanding of mobility cultures, neo-tribes and alternative cultural formations in Europe. One-page abstract due (no more than 500 words): Thurs 28 October 2021

Tourist Studies, 2021

While the quality of life (QoL) concept in tourism research has gained momentum, scholarly work h... more While the quality of life (QoL) concept in tourism research has gained momentum, scholarly work has focused on host QoL and tourist-host relations, rather than exploring and analysing the perception, interpretation and understanding of QoL among different social groups in a given tourist destination. Macao is a densely populated tourism destination and designated World Centre of Tourism and Leisure, where local residents and migrants work and cohabit side by side. By broadening the scope of research through in-depth interviews, our research findings highlight how different social groups in Macao experience QoL differently. While all groups perceive positive economic impacts and appreciate career opportunities from tourism development, the analysis raises questions as to the QoL of residents and migrants, and the social sustainability of Macao. The study recommends that authorities embed a social sustainability focus in deliberations,

Tourism and mobilities: local-global connections, 2008

Tourist Studies, 2021

While the label 'backpacker' didn't originate in 1990 when first presented at an academic confere... more While the label 'backpacker' didn't originate in 1990 when first presented at an academic conference by the late Philip L. Pearce, its usage rose within an emerging academic discourse community that established shared interests, sources of information, terminology, and methods of communication, along with a certain level of expertise and knowledge on the subject. While the community internationalised and embraced interdisciplinary approaches, a review of the academic scholarship points to the communities increasing instability, as differential authoritative voices conflict over discursive conventions that regulate our understanding of backpacking. While once conceptual and theoretical developments in backpacker research were built through subject level consensus, distinctions within the community point to new hierarchies, with their own particular schools of thought and reinterpretations. As disparities, incongruities and deviations in backpacker research output emerge, this overview explores current research directions and identifies paradoxes, challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.

Religions, 2020

From books to movies, the media is now flush with spiritual and wellness tourist-related images, ... more From books to movies, the media is now flush with spiritual and wellness tourist-related images, films, and fiction (which are primarily produced in the West) about Southeast Asia. Combined with the positive effects of spiritual practices, greater numbers of tourists are travelling to Southeast Asia for mindfulness, yoga, and other spiritual pursuits. Influenced by popular mass media coverage, such as Hollywood movies and literary bestsellers like Eat Pray Love (2006) and tourism imaginaries about particular peoples and places, spiritual tourists are visiting Southeast Asia in increasing numbers. They travel to learn about and practice mindfulness, so as to recharge their batteries, achieve spiritual fulfillment, enhance their spiritual well-being, and find a true self. However, there is a notable lack of scholarly work around the nature and outcomes of spiritual tourism in the region. Owing to its Buddhist temples, cultural heritage, religious history, infrastructure, and perceived safety, Chiang Mai in Thailand, in particular, has become a major spiritual tourism destination. Based on participant observation including informal conversations, and 10 semi-structured interviews in Chiang Mai during two summers in 2016 and 2018, our research explored why Western tourists travel to Chiang Mai to engage in mindfulness practices regardless of their religious affiliation. We explored their faith in their spiritual practice in Chiang Mai. Rather than the faith implied in religion, this faith refers to trust or confidence in something. Interestingly, none of the informants identified themselves as Buddhist even though many had practiced Buddhist mindfulness for years. They had faith that mindfulness would resolve problems, such as depression and anxiety, following life events such as divorces, deaths in family, drug abuse, or at least help free them from worries. They noted that mindfulness practices were a constructive means of dealing with negative life events. This study found that the informants sought to embed mindfulness and other spiritual practices into the fabric of their everyday life. Their faith in mindfulness led them to a destination where Buddhist heritage, history, and culture are concentrated but also consumed. Whilst discussing the preliminary findings through a critical lens, the research recommends future research pathways.

World Leisure Journal, 2020

Utilizing 14 semi-structured interviews in a non-western context, this exploratory study examines... more Utilizing 14 semi-structured interviews in a non-western context, this exploratory study examines how Filipino migrant workers' leisure satisfaction and QoL are intertwined in Macao, China. The study reveals that Filipino migrant workers regard "family and friends", and a sense of community as central to their QoL. Regarding leisure, the Filipino migrant workers experienced a lack of time-off and long working hours (structural leisure constraints) whilst living without their families in the Philippines (interpersonal leisure constraints). In addition, the Filipino migrant workers noted that few leisure options were available to them, and given commercial options dominate in Macao, the perceived cost of leisure participation clashes with the Filipino migrant workers responsibility to send remittances home. It is recommended that authorities and employers explore the importance of subjective QoL indicators such as sense of community that emerge from marginalized social groups, such as migrant workers, into their measurement systems and policy deliberations, to create a livable and sustainable community for all. Our study enriches the extant research by broadening the research location to focus on "voices" from low income migrants in a non-western context.

JOURNAL OF CONVENTION & EVENT TOURISM, 2020

The purpose of this paper is to gain a better understanding of user acceptance of Biometric Techn... more The purpose of this paper is to gain a better understanding of
user acceptance of Biometric Technologies (BT) at outdoor
music festivals in the United Kingdom. While research on such
technologies, such as facial recognition is limited in the events
context, they have already been deployed at music festivals to
deal with issues of security, safety and crowd management.
Using an extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), a
self-administered questionnaire was completed by young
adults in the United Kingdom who had previously been to a
music festival. The study found factors such as privacy, reliability and accuracy did not have a significant impact on user
acceptance. Other factors, such as trust, compatibility and convenience were found to have a significant positive impact on
perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness and attitude to
use. As the findings indicate that accuracy and privacy do not
impact BT acceptance, the paper explores how organizers can
be transparent and accountable as to their intentions to use
BT, so as to justify the usefulness of BT to attendees, artists,
regulators and authorities.

Via Tourism Review, 2019

This paper will describe the breakdown in the rational relationship between means and end as Maca... more This paper will describe the breakdown in the rational relationship between means and end as Macau transformed from a colonial territory to a globalizing world centre of tourism and leisure. The paper moves beyond discourses that understand tourism and tourism development in Asia as mediated “authenticity” acting as a catalyst for further economic development or a means to affirm legitimacy (Burns, 2008). We argue that the occult economy paradigm offers an interpretative
framework by putting the spotlight on the rich and the powerful rather than those in poverty and the powerless (Nader, 1972), so as to grasp how tourism, as a highly ambiguous term, has been
framed by those in positions of power as solely underpinning its success. This approach requires studying “the colonizers rather than the colonized, the culture of power rather than the culture of
the powerless” (Nader, 1972, p. 289) by asking “common sense” questions in reverse about why government, businesses, decision makers, and creators of creators of socio-economic politics failed
to gamble on more conventional markets when seeking to meet the needs of its citizens, and why the introduction of the category of “World Centre of Tourism and Leisure” as a barometer of “economic growth” and social stability obscures nefarious transactions, rumors, speculation, arcane rituals and irrational desires, and thwarted chances for improving quality of life.

Hospitality & Society, 2019

The nature of Chinese consumption and hospitality has evolved rapidly since the post-1980s middle... more The nature of Chinese consumption and hospitality has evolved rapidly since the post-1980s middle class adopted new lifestyles and consumption choices after the opening up of the economy and society. This study explores the logics underpinning conspicuous consumption of wine in China by way of an exploratory factor analysis of 253 respondents at a wine festival. The study found that conspicuous tendencies manifest themselves with wine consumption, but are affected by culture and traditional values. The study found that social and personal influences mediate how individuals perceive and experience consumption in ways that do not wholly follow western practices. This article contributes to the existing hospitality literature by conceptualizing from a consumer perspective, how a product or brand has the potential to become conspicuous within the Chinese hospitality context and explores implications for hospitality research by generating a thorough understanding of links between conspicuous consumption and hospitality.

Tourism Management Perspectives, 2019

Couchsurfing (CS) was founded in 2003 as a non-profit for those interested in creating a common r... more Couchsurfing (CS) was founded in 2003 as a non-profit for those interested in creating a common resource for world-wide hospitality exchange and low cost tourism. Built around a non-market communal sharing model, it became a for-profit in August 2011. Applying a discourse relational model approach, this study characterizes how competing discursive articulations over the conversion led to a discursive strategy of moral justification as management sought to retain its non-profit, alternative, democratic imaginary. The study finds that the justifications gained initial appeal, but ultimately lost credibility due to a mismanaged conversion. By articulating the competing discourses through the sacred value protection model (SVPM), this study provides insights into the way in which a management strategy can be interpreted at a micro-analysis level. It recommends that management decisions need to start from the activities of the organizations members, groups and networks so as to account for their emotions, motivations and actions.

Tourism Geographies, 2019

While dominant discourses, media representations and corporate entities in China downplay the pre... more While dominant discourses, media representations and corporate entities in China downplay the presence of Chinese mainland gambling in Macau, Beijing sanctions millions of its citizens to make the journey to Macau to gamble each year. While Macau’s success is often put down to the extent to which visitors are drawn to a secular destination with integrated resorts to engage in individualistic activities, our approach explores Chinese gambling tourists’ movements, rituals and behaviours along post-structuralist lines, so as to generate new insights. The analysis shows how the metaphor of pilgrimage is an important lens to
address individual and communal practices amongst outbound Chinese gambling tourists and brings to light the hyper-meaningfulness, shared values, ritualization, play, risk, and liminal conditions that characterise the processes of their entanglements and the centrality of commercial and political interests. In particular, the analysis indicates the need to explore the significance of cultural, spiritual, economic and social dimensions of Chinese out-bound tourism, as well as the unique discourses of power and control affecting their movement and practices. By reframing and reconceptualising gambling tourists as a Chinese pilgrimage, we account for manifestations of culture, governmentality and intentional ritualization as well as contribute an alternative construction of pilgrimage beyond euro-centric accounts, which in turn, will stimulate discussion on geographies of pilgrimage

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to deconstruct the backpacker label by reconstructing it u... more Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to deconstruct the backpacker label by reconstructing it using the historical antecedent of drifting. Following the deconstruction of backpacking’s near past, the author build a clearer conceptual foundation for backpacking’s future.

Design/methodology/approach - The study is framed by scenario planning, which demands a critical review of the backpacking and an appreciation of its history in order to understand its future.

Findings - Backpacking, ever evolving, remains difficult to articulate and challenges researchers to “keep up” with its complexity and heterogeneity. This paper argues that researchers must learn more about how backpacking “works” by opening a dialogue with its past, before engaging in further research. The paper finds that a poor conceptualisation of backpacking has led to a codification of backpacker criteria.

Practical implications - Backpacking remains a research topic which draws disparate researchers using criteria that produces disparate results and deviations. By understanding its past, researchers will be better placed to explore the emancipatory impulses that drive backpackers today and in the future.

Originality/value - This papers’ value lies in the retrospection process which explores backpacking’s near past so as to “make sense” of present research and present scenarios for it is the immediate future. The paper re-anchors backpacking by investigating the major historical, social and cultural events leading up to its emergence.

Keywords: Scenario planning, Backpackers, Backpacking, Drifting, Tourism futures, Tourism history

Anthropological Journal of European Cultures, 2023

While ‘polycrisis’ was coined by a French theorist of complexity called Edgar Morin and his co-au... more While ‘polycrisis’ was coined by a French theorist of complexity called Edgar Morin and his co-author Anne Brigitte Kern (1999), the word was more recently popularised by the historian Adam Tooze (2022) to describe the interaction of disparate crises at once, in such ways that the overall impact far exceeds the sum of each part. The Covid-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the climate emergency, cryptocurrency price busts, democratic deficits, raging inflation, profound social inequality and austerity, spiralling energy costs and what has been dubbed a global crisis in mental health mean complex societies are facing an extended period of existential uncertainties. Mutually implicative, these crises of the past, present and possible future are interacting in such ways that bring volatility, complexity, ambiguity and uncertainty to societies and individuals, often in completely unforeseeable, unintended and unpredictable ways.

Channel View, 2023

This book presents new contributions in backpacking research from various disciplines, capturing ... more This book presents new contributions in backpacking research from various disciplines, capturing the diversity of backpacker contexts, motives and behaviours. It takes a fresh, critical and reflexive look at over 40 years of backpacking research and seeks to recentre backpacking research before introducing new perspectives on backpacking and global backpacker cultures from previously unexplored perspectives. The chapters examine contemporary backpacker culture and mobilities, and the value and worth of backpacking both for individuals seeking an alternative life course and transformation, and destinations and businesses who value their economic and cultural potential. The volume aims to make sense of current research in order to understand backpacking's future, and produce new directions for conceptual, theoretical and methodological development and future research. It will be useful for students and researchers in tourism, sociology and anthropology.

Leisure Studies, 2022

While changes in society continue to inform understandings of what leisure is and how it manifest... more While changes in society continue to inform understandings of what leisure is and how it manifests itself, the emergence of Chinese outbound tourists, with specific motivations, travel styles and leisure choices are having powerful impacts on multiple host destinations. While university campuses have long been marked as visitor attractions in China, this study explores the motivations and implications of outbound Chinese tourists visiting university campuses abroad for leisure. On site qualitative interviews took place with 25 fully independent Chinese tourists at three campuses in Seoul, South Korea and a campus in Chiang Mai, Thailand. The study results found that Chinese visitors mark specific university campuses as attractions and are motivated to visit because of their prestige, by novelty and exploration, emotion and nostalgia and learning and knowledge seeking. This study argues that campus tourism may be difficult to develop and manage as a well-defined product that meets the needs of Chinese tourists, university governors and university stakeholders. The study explores the implications for universities and recommends universities begin a critical evaluation of prestige markers and especially those markers present in the Chinese cultural, pop-culture and (social) media context, which may be counterproductive to the primary mission of universities.

Current Issues in Tourism, 2022

When the linguistic innovation and phrase overtourism was used in an online news report to descri... more When the linguistic innovation and phrase overtourism was used in an online news report to describe excessive tourism in Iceland in 2016, legacy and social media soon following with in-depth articles and visual representations of perceived excessive tourism in other locations around the world. Given the growing calls for action on overtourism, this study takes a social network analysis (SNA) approach, using a network analysis and visualization software package called NodeXL Pro, to better understand the 10,325 tweets which used the hashtag 'overtourism' between July 2013 and September 2020. By exploring central users, conversation starters, gatekeepers and influencers, the analysis indicates that an ad ¶ hoc network was built around #overtourism on twitter. The analysis indicates that this network is held together by a small number of experts, who play a key role in presenting, distributing and circulating information about this controversial topic. While the studies practical contribution is the use of NodeXL Pro for advanced social media network analysis, the findings also indicate that the ability of these experts to influence perceptions of overtourism inside and outside twitter will depend on whether it can engage broader publics as the tourism sector recovers from a global pandemic.

Tourism Review, 2022

Abstract Purpose As tourism destinations grapple with declines in tourist arrivals due to COVID-1... more Abstract
Purpose
As tourism destinations grapple with declines in tourist arrivals due to COVID-19 measures, scholarly debate on overtourism remains active, with discussions on solutions that could be enacted to contain the excessive regrowth of tourism and the return of “overtourism”. As social science holds an important role and responsibility to inform the debate on overtourism, this paper aims to understand overtourism by examining it as a discursive formation.

Design / methodology / approach
The paper explores recurring thematic threads in scholarly overtourism texts, given the phrases coherence as a nodal-point is partially held in place by a collective body of texts authored by a network of scholars who have invested in it. The paper uses interdiscursivity as an interpretive framework to identify overlapping thematic trajectories found in existing discourses.

Findings
Overtourism, as a discursive formation, determines what can and should be said about the self-evident “truths” of excessive tourist arrivals, the changes tourists bring to destinations and the range of discursive solutions available to manage or end overtourism. As the interpellation of these thematic threads into scholarly texts is based on a sense of crisis and urgency, the authors find that the themes contain rhetoric, arguments and metaphors that problematize tourists and construct them as objects in need of control and correction.

Originality / value
While the persistence of the discursive formation will be determined by the degree to which scholarly and other actors recognize themselves in it, this paper may enable overtourism scholars to become aware of the limits of their discursive domain and help them to expand the discourse or weave a new one.

We invite scholars to submit theoretical work, case studies and empirical research, for the purpo... more We invite scholars to submit theoretical work, case studies and empirical research, for the purpose of expanding our understanding of mobility cultures, neo-tribes and alternative cultural formations in Europe. One-page abstract due (no more than 500 words): Thurs 28 October 2021

Tourist Studies, 2021

While the quality of life (QoL) concept in tourism research has gained momentum, scholarly work h... more While the quality of life (QoL) concept in tourism research has gained momentum, scholarly work has focused on host QoL and tourist-host relations, rather than exploring and analysing the perception, interpretation and understanding of QoL among different social groups in a given tourist destination. Macao is a densely populated tourism destination and designated World Centre of Tourism and Leisure, where local residents and migrants work and cohabit side by side. By broadening the scope of research through in-depth interviews, our research findings highlight how different social groups in Macao experience QoL differently. While all groups perceive positive economic impacts and appreciate career opportunities from tourism development, the analysis raises questions as to the QoL of residents and migrants, and the social sustainability of Macao. The study recommends that authorities embed a social sustainability focus in deliberations,

Tourism and mobilities: local-global connections, 2008

Tourist Studies, 2021

While the label 'backpacker' didn't originate in 1990 when first presented at an academic confere... more While the label 'backpacker' didn't originate in 1990 when first presented at an academic conference by the late Philip L. Pearce, its usage rose within an emerging academic discourse community that established shared interests, sources of information, terminology, and methods of communication, along with a certain level of expertise and knowledge on the subject. While the community internationalised and embraced interdisciplinary approaches, a review of the academic scholarship points to the communities increasing instability, as differential authoritative voices conflict over discursive conventions that regulate our understanding of backpacking. While once conceptual and theoretical developments in backpacker research were built through subject level consensus, distinctions within the community point to new hierarchies, with their own particular schools of thought and reinterpretations. As disparities, incongruities and deviations in backpacker research output emerge, this overview explores current research directions and identifies paradoxes, challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.

Religions, 2020

From books to movies, the media is now flush with spiritual and wellness tourist-related images, ... more From books to movies, the media is now flush with spiritual and wellness tourist-related images, films, and fiction (which are primarily produced in the West) about Southeast Asia. Combined with the positive effects of spiritual practices, greater numbers of tourists are travelling to Southeast Asia for mindfulness, yoga, and other spiritual pursuits. Influenced by popular mass media coverage, such as Hollywood movies and literary bestsellers like Eat Pray Love (2006) and tourism imaginaries about particular peoples and places, spiritual tourists are visiting Southeast Asia in increasing numbers. They travel to learn about and practice mindfulness, so as to recharge their batteries, achieve spiritual fulfillment, enhance their spiritual well-being, and find a true self. However, there is a notable lack of scholarly work around the nature and outcomes of spiritual tourism in the region. Owing to its Buddhist temples, cultural heritage, religious history, infrastructure, and perceived safety, Chiang Mai in Thailand, in particular, has become a major spiritual tourism destination. Based on participant observation including informal conversations, and 10 semi-structured interviews in Chiang Mai during two summers in 2016 and 2018, our research explored why Western tourists travel to Chiang Mai to engage in mindfulness practices regardless of their religious affiliation. We explored their faith in their spiritual practice in Chiang Mai. Rather than the faith implied in religion, this faith refers to trust or confidence in something. Interestingly, none of the informants identified themselves as Buddhist even though many had practiced Buddhist mindfulness for years. They had faith that mindfulness would resolve problems, such as depression and anxiety, following life events such as divorces, deaths in family, drug abuse, or at least help free them from worries. They noted that mindfulness practices were a constructive means of dealing with negative life events. This study found that the informants sought to embed mindfulness and other spiritual practices into the fabric of their everyday life. Their faith in mindfulness led them to a destination where Buddhist heritage, history, and culture are concentrated but also consumed. Whilst discussing the preliminary findings through a critical lens, the research recommends future research pathways.

World Leisure Journal, 2020

Utilizing 14 semi-structured interviews in a non-western context, this exploratory study examines... more Utilizing 14 semi-structured interviews in a non-western context, this exploratory study examines how Filipino migrant workers' leisure satisfaction and QoL are intertwined in Macao, China. The study reveals that Filipino migrant workers regard "family and friends", and a sense of community as central to their QoL. Regarding leisure, the Filipino migrant workers experienced a lack of time-off and long working hours (structural leisure constraints) whilst living without their families in the Philippines (interpersonal leisure constraints). In addition, the Filipino migrant workers noted that few leisure options were available to them, and given commercial options dominate in Macao, the perceived cost of leisure participation clashes with the Filipino migrant workers responsibility to send remittances home. It is recommended that authorities and employers explore the importance of subjective QoL indicators such as sense of community that emerge from marginalized social groups, such as migrant workers, into their measurement systems and policy deliberations, to create a livable and sustainable community for all. Our study enriches the extant research by broadening the research location to focus on "voices" from low income migrants in a non-western context.

JOURNAL OF CONVENTION & EVENT TOURISM, 2020

The purpose of this paper is to gain a better understanding of user acceptance of Biometric Techn... more The purpose of this paper is to gain a better understanding of
user acceptance of Biometric Technologies (BT) at outdoor
music festivals in the United Kingdom. While research on such
technologies, such as facial recognition is limited in the events
context, they have already been deployed at music festivals to
deal with issues of security, safety and crowd management.
Using an extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), a
self-administered questionnaire was completed by young
adults in the United Kingdom who had previously been to a
music festival. The study found factors such as privacy, reliability and accuracy did not have a significant impact on user
acceptance. Other factors, such as trust, compatibility and convenience were found to have a significant positive impact on
perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness and attitude to
use. As the findings indicate that accuracy and privacy do not
impact BT acceptance, the paper explores how organizers can
be transparent and accountable as to their intentions to use
BT, so as to justify the usefulness of BT to attendees, artists,
regulators and authorities.

Via Tourism Review, 2019

This paper will describe the breakdown in the rational relationship between means and end as Maca... more This paper will describe the breakdown in the rational relationship between means and end as Macau transformed from a colonial territory to a globalizing world centre of tourism and leisure. The paper moves beyond discourses that understand tourism and tourism development in Asia as mediated “authenticity” acting as a catalyst for further economic development or a means to affirm legitimacy (Burns, 2008). We argue that the occult economy paradigm offers an interpretative
framework by putting the spotlight on the rich and the powerful rather than those in poverty and the powerless (Nader, 1972), so as to grasp how tourism, as a highly ambiguous term, has been
framed by those in positions of power as solely underpinning its success. This approach requires studying “the colonizers rather than the colonized, the culture of power rather than the culture of
the powerless” (Nader, 1972, p. 289) by asking “common sense” questions in reverse about why government, businesses, decision makers, and creators of creators of socio-economic politics failed
to gamble on more conventional markets when seeking to meet the needs of its citizens, and why the introduction of the category of “World Centre of Tourism and Leisure” as a barometer of “economic growth” and social stability obscures nefarious transactions, rumors, speculation, arcane rituals and irrational desires, and thwarted chances for improving quality of life.

Hospitality & Society, 2019

The nature of Chinese consumption and hospitality has evolved rapidly since the post-1980s middle... more The nature of Chinese consumption and hospitality has evolved rapidly since the post-1980s middle class adopted new lifestyles and consumption choices after the opening up of the economy and society. This study explores the logics underpinning conspicuous consumption of wine in China by way of an exploratory factor analysis of 253 respondents at a wine festival. The study found that conspicuous tendencies manifest themselves with wine consumption, but are affected by culture and traditional values. The study found that social and personal influences mediate how individuals perceive and experience consumption in ways that do not wholly follow western practices. This article contributes to the existing hospitality literature by conceptualizing from a consumer perspective, how a product or brand has the potential to become conspicuous within the Chinese hospitality context and explores implications for hospitality research by generating a thorough understanding of links between conspicuous consumption and hospitality.

Tourism Management Perspectives, 2019

Couchsurfing (CS) was founded in 2003 as a non-profit for those interested in creating a common r... more Couchsurfing (CS) was founded in 2003 as a non-profit for those interested in creating a common resource for world-wide hospitality exchange and low cost tourism. Built around a non-market communal sharing model, it became a for-profit in August 2011. Applying a discourse relational model approach, this study characterizes how competing discursive articulations over the conversion led to a discursive strategy of moral justification as management sought to retain its non-profit, alternative, democratic imaginary. The study finds that the justifications gained initial appeal, but ultimately lost credibility due to a mismanaged conversion. By articulating the competing discourses through the sacred value protection model (SVPM), this study provides insights into the way in which a management strategy can be interpreted at a micro-analysis level. It recommends that management decisions need to start from the activities of the organizations members, groups and networks so as to account for their emotions, motivations and actions.

Tourism Geographies, 2019

While dominant discourses, media representations and corporate entities in China downplay the pre... more While dominant discourses, media representations and corporate entities in China downplay the presence of Chinese mainland gambling in Macau, Beijing sanctions millions of its citizens to make the journey to Macau to gamble each year. While Macau’s success is often put down to the extent to which visitors are drawn to a secular destination with integrated resorts to engage in individualistic activities, our approach explores Chinese gambling tourists’ movements, rituals and behaviours along post-structuralist lines, so as to generate new insights. The analysis shows how the metaphor of pilgrimage is an important lens to
address individual and communal practices amongst outbound Chinese gambling tourists and brings to light the hyper-meaningfulness, shared values, ritualization, play, risk, and liminal conditions that characterise the processes of their entanglements and the centrality of commercial and political interests. In particular, the analysis indicates the need to explore the significance of cultural, spiritual, economic and social dimensions of Chinese out-bound tourism, as well as the unique discourses of power and control affecting their movement and practices. By reframing and reconceptualising gambling tourists as a Chinese pilgrimage, we account for manifestations of culture, governmentality and intentional ritualization as well as contribute an alternative construction of pilgrimage beyond euro-centric accounts, which in turn, will stimulate discussion on geographies of pilgrimage

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to deconstruct the backpacker label by reconstructing it u... more Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to deconstruct the backpacker label by reconstructing it using the historical antecedent of drifting. Following the deconstruction of backpacking’s near past, the author build a clearer conceptual foundation for backpacking’s future.

Design/methodology/approach - The study is framed by scenario planning, which demands a critical review of the backpacking and an appreciation of its history in order to understand its future.

Findings - Backpacking, ever evolving, remains difficult to articulate and challenges researchers to “keep up” with its complexity and heterogeneity. This paper argues that researchers must learn more about how backpacking “works” by opening a dialogue with its past, before engaging in further research. The paper finds that a poor conceptualisation of backpacking has led to a codification of backpacker criteria.

Practical implications - Backpacking remains a research topic which draws disparate researchers using criteria that produces disparate results and deviations. By understanding its past, researchers will be better placed to explore the emancipatory impulses that drive backpackers today and in the future.

Originality/value - This papers’ value lies in the retrospection process which explores backpacking’s near past so as to “make sense” of present research and present scenarios for it is the immediate future. The paper re-anchors backpacking by investigating the major historical, social and cultural events leading up to its emergence.

Keywords: Scenario planning, Backpackers, Backpacking, Drifting, Tourism futures, Tourism history

We invite you to discuss, reflect and develop upon issues pertaining to sustainability and the ne... more We invite you to discuss, reflect and develop upon issues pertaining to sustainability and the nexus of migration and tourism. We are particularly interested in the complexities of trends, issues, challenges and opportunities around migration linked tourism. Abstracts by 15, March.

Very pleased to announce CFP 'Nexus of Migration & Tourism: Creating Social Sustainability' Symposium at Vietnam National University Hanoi. More info: http://tourism-migration.co.uk #tourismmigration18 @bournemouthuni #Vietnam #Hanoi #migration #tourism #sustainability #wellbeing #ASEAN

Journal of China Tourism Research, 2020

The CFP on “China, Tourism and (Soft) Power” remains open for full paper submission (deadline: ... more The CFP on “China, Tourism and (Soft) Power” remains open for full paper submission (deadline: 14 February 2020).

Michael

Dear colleagues, We are currently seeking expression of Interest / chapter proposals for a book o... more Dear colleagues,
We are currently seeking expression of Interest / chapter proposals for a book on backpacking/backpacker culture.

There have been three previous “seminal” books on backpacking.

- Richards, G., & Wilson, J. (Eds.). (2004). The global nomad: Backpacker travel in theory and practice. Channel View Publications.
- Hannam, K., & Ateljevic, I. (Eds.). (2007). Backpacker tourism: Concepts and profiles. Channel View Publications.
- Hannam, K., & Diekmann, A. (Eds.). (2010). Beyond backpacker tourism: Mobilities and experiences. Channel View Publications.

These works have provided insights into backpacking for a generation of undergraduate, postgraduate students and researchers. However, as it’s nearly a decade since the last publication, it’s time for an update!

I'd be very happy to chat through any chapter ideas,
Many thanks,
Michael

Via, 2019

Sommaire du numéro : https://journals.openedition.org/viatourism/4092 1/ Linda Boukhris et Em... more Sommaire du numéro :
https://journals.openedition.org/viatourism/4092

1/ Linda Boukhris et Emmanuelle Peyvel
Le tourisme à l’épreuve des paradigmes post et décoloniaux / Tourism in the context of postcolonial and decolonial paradigms

2/ Sarani Pitor Pakan
Can the ‘Other’ Frame Back in Tourism Studies? Experimenting to Respond in an Asymmetrical Dialogue / « L’Autre » peut-il invertir le cadrage dans le champ des études touristiques ? Tentative de réponse dans un dialogue asymétrique.

3/Anthony Goreau-Ponceaud
Colonialité et tourisme : la fabrique des identités et des altérités en Inde / Coloniality and tourism: the fabric of identities and alterities in India

4/ Sarah Coulouma
De la tourismification d’un village au déplacement de sa population : expressions d’un rapport hiérarchique entre l’État chinois et la nationalité minoritaire wa / From the Tourismification of a Village to the Displacement of its Population: Expressions of a Hierarchical Relationship Between the Chinese State and the Wa Ethnic Minority

5/ Michael O’Regan
Post-Colonial Macau: hope and despair in a World Centre of Tourism and Leisure / Macao à l’ère postcoloniale : espoir et désespoir dans un centre mondial du tourisme et des loisirs

6/ Habib Saidi
On Biohospitality: Hotels as Barracks or the Waiter’s Three Bodies/
Sur la biohospitalité : les hôtels comme casernes ou les trois corps du serveur

7/ Interview
Linda Boukhris, Interview with Nelson Graburn, Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley [Texte intégral]

Introduction du numéro spécial :

https://journals.openedition.org/viatourism/4097

Plan de l'introduction :
1/ Les études touristiques face à la réception du paradigme postcolonial : une exception française
2/ Dimension heuristique et paradoxes du paradigme décolonial dans les études touristiques
3/ Repenser dialectiquement le centre et la périphérie : pour une approche critique du tourisme au sein des anciennes métropoles coloniales et impériales
4/ Pour une approche matérialiste de la fabrique des altérités et des identités en situation touristique