Contingent and affective disruptions: towards relational tourism geographies of what makes things food

de Jong, A. and Waitt, G. (2022) Contingent and affective disruptions: towards relational tourism geographies of what makes things food. Tourist Studies, 22(2), pp. 117-129. (doi: 10.1177/14687976221096912)

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Abstract

Human intentionality forms just one aspect in understanding the tourist’s engagement with food, and yet tends to dominate food tourism research; whilst food itself tends to remain somewhat ‘passive stuff’. A focus on the active presence of food we argue is rare in food tourism scholarship. This paper thus explores how tourist scholars offering insights into the practices and experiences of eating in tourism contexts have taken to spatial and relational approaches to explore what it means to eat during travel. We argue that tourist studies literature on food holds the potential to unlock the complexity of what tourists eat, and why. We do this by discussing two broad ‘spatial turns’ relating to tourism geographies of eating as relational. In doing this we attend to questions of how things become food through attunement to sociospatial-material relationships, experiences and situated practices. We show how these two relational approaches offer exciting research agendas that rethink food tourism not as a predetermined, structured human experience or touristic agenda – but as something that is ongoing, and made through individuals’ sensorial engagement with the social and material world.

Item Type:Articles
Additional Information:This research was funded by an Early Career Visiting Fellowship with the Australian Centre for Culture, Environment, Society and Space, University of Wollongong, Australia.
Status:Published
Refereed:Yes
Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID:de Jong, Dr Anna
Authors: de Jong, A., and Waitt, G.
College/School:College of Social Sciences > School of Social & Environmental Sustainability
Journal Name:Tourist Studies
Publisher:SAGE Publications
ISSN:1468-7976
ISSN (Online):1741-3206
Published Online:05 May 2022
Copyright Holders:Copyright © 2022 The Authors
First Published:First published in Tourist Studies 22(2): 117-129
Publisher Policy:Reproduced under a Creative Commons License

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