The Rise of the Asian Female Digital Nomad

This feminist thesis contributes to our understanding of tourist experiences by exploring the constraints and empowerment of Asian women digital nomads. It investigates the complexity and the diversity of Asian women digital nomads and elucidates the issues of gender and race in the women’s quests for a nomadic lifestyle. The empirical data were drawn from mixed method techniques of semi-structured interview and photo-elicitation, which gave the seven women opportunities to share, reflect, and discuss their thoughts and experiences while being digital nomads. The findings are presented as three overarching stories of reasons, constraints, and empowerment. Most of the women experienced constraints in various forms in their search for professional, personal, and spatial freedoms which evidently shaped their digital nomadic experiences. In the midst of their constraints, the women were resilient and robust in their negotiations of westernized digital nomad discourses and were able to transform their selves. The diversity and complexity of the Asian women digital nomad experiences revealed that their experiences were also shaped by the intersection of gender and race

Chapter 1 How open borders can unlock cultures

In March 2014, the e-mail list of the European Academic Network on Romani Studies1 hosted a discussion on definitions of the population known as ‘Roma’. It began when one of the subscribers to the list – which at the time brought together some 350 academics who specialised in Romani/Gypsy studies – asked for reactions to two generalisations which she came across while preparing a legal review of a document on cultural rights: (1) that all Roma speak a variety of the same language, Romanes; and (2) that Roma generally consider themselves to be a nation. Some two-dozen scholars posted their reactions, which together offer a fairly exhaustive summary of contemporary views on the subjec

City marketing and convention bureaus value propositions in the post-covid time

City marketing and convention bureaus value propositions in the post-covid timeThe role of convention bureaus across the world is to market destinations and cities.This paper explores destination marketing in the post pandemic time. It focusses on thevalues that convention bureaus, a key actor in the meetings industry, propose topotential visitors. The concept of value propositions (VPs) is commonly regarded as astrategic tool for organizations to communicate what and how they will provide benefitsto clients in their offerings of products or services (Payne, Frow and Eggert 2017, Payneet al. 2020). A value proposition is a central part of the business model. VPs can bethought of in terms of promises made to clients or to market segments in externalcommunication (Grönroos and Voima 2013). This calls for an appropriate packaging andpresentation of the values in the communication of organisations (Payne, et al. 2017).From a strategic perspective, VPs affects the process communicating and deliveringvalues (Lanning 2020). Previous research of VPs within in tourism studies include valueco-creation and co-destruction in tourism services (Assiouras et al. 2022), value andtourist brand loyalty (Bose et al. 2022), tourism stakeholder value-co creation (Carrasco-Farré et al. 2022), value propositions in digitalisation processes (Endres et al. 2020) valuepropositions for community building (Butler and Szromek 2019), power in tourismmarketing (Kannisto 2016) and values in experience design (Tussyadiah 2014). The topicappears however to be understudied from a communication perspective and also withrespect to how unexpected events, such as the pandemic, frame the processes ofcommunicating values. The aim of this paper is to advance the knowledge about valuepropositions socio-cultural dimensions by exploring how benefits for meetings bookersand visitors are discursively constructed. The study will answer three questions: how isvalue proposed in the marketing communication of convention bureaus, and whatprofessional meetings discourses are formed in the post covid time?Case, method and theoryTexts and images in the online marketing of 20 convention bureaus (CBs) was collectedbetween May 2022 and March 2023. Dispersed across five world continents, most CBsare located in large cities. A CBs main purpose is to increase the number of meetings ina destination. CBs collaborate with companies in its area to market their offerings, andthey are often a unit of a DMO of a city or a municipality's business department. Themeetings industry increased its activity in the beginning of 2022, when all restrictionswere gradually lifted, and therefore the data constitute an example of marketing thatwas planned and executed during a crisis. The material was imported and text-scannedin NVivo software. Codes were created inductively, by identifying presentations ofbenefits in chunks of texts and images that were manually coded as value propositions,screenshot by screenshot. Inspired by discourse theory (Wetherell et al. 2001), thesecond step of the analysis aimed for a more abstract level. The theory wasoperationalized by looking for reoccurring expressions used to propose value, terms,narratives, symbols, metaphors, and images, and by identifying things that are excluded,and ambiguities in the communication. A set of identified values emerged, as a map ofhow convention bureaus on a global level imagine the meetings demand. The analysis2discusses some vantage points that the CBs depart from. The analytical perspective thusprovides a broad societal interpretation of the themes.FindingsTwo main VP discourses emerged. First, the offering of “The meeting in a destination” isconstructed as place-bound meetings. Place is represented in images of historicalbuildings, spectacular nature, or references to place specific professional networks. Thecommunicated benefits emphasise physical interactions and location in relation to otherplaces. The place bound discourse constructs an essential need of being and engaging ininteractions and experience place, for successful meetings. The CBs engage in aplaceification of professional meetings.Second, the “Sustainable meetings” is a morally packaged offering, that is often basedon presenting benefits of ethical concern such as expressions of care for theenvironment or displays of certifications and expert lists of wise consumption choices.This offering thus constructs morally conscious and responsible choices at the center ofa good meeting. Sustainable consumption is constructed as a norm, in this ethicificationof the professional meetings offering. In sum, the representations relate to differentnorms like mobility and the ethical. The first emphasises experiences of place, whichpartly contradicts the offering of sustainability, The placeification contradicts theethicification of meetings, in so far that places require physical infrastructures andtravelling. The ethicification of meetings stress on the other hand travelling aspotentially harmful for the environment. The sustainability theme does not stress lesstravelling, it rather suggests alternative forms.Discussion and conclusionsThe communication can be interpreted as formations of new norms emerging in relationto change in society. The meeting industry has always emphasised the value of a specificlocation for meetings, an essential part of the tourism industry business models.Revenues depend on sold rooms, dinners, and personal service in that place.Experiences of place requires people to be there. This communication may thereforeseem like a given vantage point. However, digitalisation of society has acceleratedduring Covid-19 pandemic and it seems to have paved a way for customer segments thatdo not want to, or cannot not travel to a remote destination, for different reasons.Especially urgent during the pandemic and to some extent still valid, digital meetingformats are still used. The meeting industry have had to address the question ofmobility, where digital meetings formats could be part of a possible venue in asustainable direction. Carbon emissions from aviation is a significant contributor toclimate change while a lot of people around the world go to meetings by plane, on aregular basis. It may be that the industry addresses these challenges by promotingsustainable meetings. Hence the communication discursively establishes the meetingsindustry as a player within sustainable development. Communication can trivializeconceptions of sustainable challenges and this study suggests that value propositionsare powerful communicative tools and that value propositions emerge in relation tochange in society.References3Assiouras, Ioannis, et al. (2022), 'Value propositions during service mega-disruptions:Exploring value co-creation and value co-destruction in service recovery',ANNALS OF TOURISM RESEARCH, 97.Ballantyne, D., P. Frow, R. J. Varey and A. Payne (2011). "Value propositions ascommunication practice: Taking a wider view." Industrial MarketingManagement 40 (2): 202-210.Bose, Sunny, et al. (2022), 'Customer-Based Place Brand Equity and Tourism: A Regional IdentityPerspective', Journal of Travel Research, 61 (3), 511-27.Butler, R. W. and Szromek, A. R. (2019), 'Incorporating the value proposition for society withbusiness models of health tourism enterprises', Sustainability, 11 (23), 6711.Carrasco-Farré, Carlos, et al. (2022), 'The stakeholder value proposition of digital platforms in anurban ecosystem', Research Policy, 51 (4), N.PAG-N.PAG.Christensen, E. Christensen and L. T. (2022). The saying and the doing. Research handbook onstrategic communication. J. Falkheimer and M. Heide, Edward Elgar Publishing.Christensen, L. T., O. Thyssen and M. Morsing (2020). "Talk–Action Dynamics: Modalities ofaspirational talk." Organization Studies.du Gay, P. and Pryke, M. (2002), Cultural Economy: Cultural Analysis and Commercial Life (SAGEPublications).Endres, Herbert, Stoiber, Kristina, and Wenzl, Nina Magdalena (2020), 'Managing digitaltransformation through hybrid business models', Journal of Business Strategy, 41 (6),49-56.Gieben, B. and S. Hall (1992). 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"The customer value proposition: evolution,development, and application in marketing." Journal of the Academy of MarketingScience: Official Publication of the Academy of Marketing Science 45(4): 467-489.Payne, A., P. Frow, L. Steinhoff and A. Eggert (2020). "Toward a comprehensive framework ofvalue proposition development: From strategy to implementation." IndustrialMarketing Management 87: 244-255.Truong, Y., G. Simmons and M. Palmer (2012). "Reciprocal value propositions in practice:Constraints in digital markets." Industrial Marketing Management 41(1): 197-206.Tussyadiah, Iis P. (2014), 'Toward a Theoretical Foundation for Experience Design in Tourism',Journal of Travel Research, 53 (5), 543-64.Wetherell, M., Taylor, S., and Yates, S.J. (2001), Discourse Theory and Practice: A Reader (SAGEPublications).Winther Jörgensen, M. and L. Phillips (1999). Diskursanalys som teori och metod. Lund,Studentlitteratur.