Dark tourism and moral disengagement in liminal spaces

Dark tourism, which deploys taboo subjects and commercially exploits the macabre, has always raised moral conflicts at a collective and individual level while providing new spaces in which morality is communicated, reconfigured and revitalized. Although earlier studies in dark tourism have focused upon the collective notions of morality with a considerable amount of discussion on the comprehension and the manner in which the history and information of dark tourist attractions are presented for tourist consumption, the individual differences of tourist morality and how tourists morally engage with death and its various forms of representation, has been neglected. In order to understand morally transgressive behavior displayed by tourists at emotionally sensitive or controversial sites and the various ways they justify their actions, the narratives of international tourists who are interested in death-related rituals at a cremation ground in India were collected and analyzed. Drawing upon a socio-cognitive theory, the moral mechanisms involved in tourist judgment towards photography of death-related rituals are discussed. It was observed that the cremation ground offers a liminal space for tourists to exercise their moral agency in an inhibitive form, as well as proactive form and that transgressive behavior among tourists is likely if they disengage from processes related to moral conduct using various moral disengagement mechanisms. This behavior arises due to an obscuring and fragmentation of human agency during moral disengagement thereby making it possible for tourists to not take ownership of the consequences of their actions

Tourism led growth hypothesis: empirical evidence from India.

Tourism activities are considered to be one of the major sources of economic growth. The importance of tourism to economic development has been widely recognized due to its contribution to the balance of payments, GDP and employment. Tourism has gradually grown over the years as a full fledge industry. The significant impact of international tourism in stimulating economic growth is admirable. For this reason, the relationship between international tourism and economic growth would seem to be an interesting and contemporary empirical issue. Current research paper attempts to examine the causal relationships between GDP and Receipts from tourism sector in India. Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) for unit root, Johanson for cointegration and Granger causality test to examine the causal relation have been employed between GDP and Receipts from tourism sector in India by using the data over the period of 1991-2017. The findings of the study showed the presence of unidirectional causality from tourism earnings to economic growth

Self-care for the researcher: dark tourism in Varanasi, India

Dark tourism is a popular niche of tourism that allows tourists to come into close proximity with death, atrocity, and the macabre, and therefore has the potential to be an emotional and even traumatic encounter for tourists. While this context has inspired tourism researchers to investigate dark tourists’ motivations, as well as the marketing and representation of dark tourism sites, we have yet to attend to its implications for the researcher. This paper analyzes the emotional experiences and aftermath of fieldwork at the cremation grounds of Varanasi, India, which involved working closely with tourists, Doms, and Aghoris by focusing on the relations of reflexivity, positionality, and emotionality. As a result, we suggest a number of reflexive and self-care practices to be put into place so as to attend to the researchers’ emotional well-being in the fieldwork process

Authenticity: The state-of-the-art in Tourism Geographies

A leading concept in the field of tourism studies, authenticity has a unique relationship with tourism geographies. This state-of-the-art review focuses on this relationship. First, we identity key themes of authenticity research in tourism geographies: place and cultural heritage; place-based experiences; place and community identity. Next, we investigate these themes to consider avenues that tourism geographies can advances the conceptualization of authenticity, particularly through a focus on the production of space, co-creation practices, anti-tourism movements, and inclusivity