International Conference Announcement
2nd Call for Papers

TOURISM & LITERATURE: TRAVEL, IMAGINATION & MYTH
22-26 July, 2004, Harrogate, Yorkshire, United Kingdom

This is the second Call for Papers for our 2004 annual
research conference on TOURISM & LITERATURE organised
by the CENTRE FOR TOURISM & CULTURAL CHANGE (Sheffield
Hallam University) and hosted by the HARROGATE
INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL. The conference will run in
tandem with the Harrogate International Festival and
the Harrogate Crime Writing Festival.

TOURISM & LITERATURE is the second conference in a
series initiated with TOURISM & PHOTOGRAPHY last July
when more than 120 delegates from 21 countries with
academic backgrounds in sociology, anthropology,
history, geography, arts and tourism studies met in
Sheffield, UK. The overall aim of this conference
series is a critical approach to the relationship
between the touristic construction and experience of
the world, and the challenge this represents for the
social, spatial, economic, aesthetic and political
organisation patterns and symbolic elements of social
existence. This raises fundamental anthropological,
sociological, political, economic, geographical and
cognitive-psychological issues related to the way we
communicate and exchange in the contemporary world,
and how this has historically developed. 

This second academic event emphasises on literature
which, through both texts and authors, has long been
an inspiration for tourists. Travel and tourist
experiences have, in turn, long inspired literature.
This inter-relationship between tourist, tourism and
literature will be at the heart of this international
conference. How does literature construct tourist
histories and identities? How do tourists 'read'
fictional texts?  How does literature produce,
prescribe and legitimate spaces for tourists?  How are
tourist expectations and experiences mediated by
literature?  What is the significance of imagined
worlds, fantastic landscapes and mythic characters for
tourism?  Why do some authors hold a fascination for
tourists?  Who are literary pilgrims and what
experiences do they have?

The conference seeks to explore and deepen our
understanding of tourism and literature relations by
bringing together an international audience of
academics, curators, writers, professionals and
tourism managers to discuss this increasingly
important field. The conference will be
multi-disciplinary drawing from literary criticism,
history, linguistics, sociology, anthropology,
cultural and political geography, etc. I am personally
interested in developing the discussion on
'perception' and 'cognition' that I feel needs to be
further introduced in the field of tourism research
and would welcome abstracts from neuro-scientists,
philosophers, linguists, aestheticians and
psycho-analysts. From a social anthropological
perspective, I would like to continue the critical
debate on the meaning of tourism as an international
phenomena - a hypothetic form of 'sacrality' of the
contemporary worlds - which a number of younger
researchers refreshed through ethnographic approaches
of tourists presented in last July's event. From a
political economy and geography perspective, I think
our last conference permitted a very fruitful
discussion on the 'imagery' of places as a way to
create familiarity, to 'know' the world through
conventionalised compositions, an argument which bears
important conceptual and political implications. 

THEMES
- Sight-seeing - encounters with literately enchanted
worlds 
- From the Bible to Lonely planet - literature as
travel liturgy 
- Production of literary spaces and the poetics of
literary landscapes 
- Recreating the world - travel, cosmogony and myth
- 'Intangible heritages' - narrative traditions,
storytelling and oral histories  
- Literary pilgrimages and the celebrity of authors
- Representing places, peoples and pasts in fictional
texts
- Alternative literatures and tourist experiences
- Diaspora and Localities: Negotiating cultural
identities through travel narratives
- The commodification and commercialisation of
literature

Please send your abstract of no more than 300 words
with full address details as an electronic file to Dr.
David Picard ([log in to unmask] ) as soon as possible
but by March 1st 2004 at the latest. 

Conference Convenors: Mike Robinson, David Picard,
William Culver-Dodds


David Picard Ph.D. 
Tourism Development & Consultancy Unit
Centre for Tourism & Cultural Change
Sheffield Hallam University
Howard Street - Owen Building
Sheffield S1 1WB
United Kingdom

Phone +44 (0) 114 225 3973
Fax +44 (0) 114 225 3343
Email [log in to unmask]
Website www.tourism-culture.com

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