couldn't resist the urge....
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The History Research Unit at the University of South Wales is
organising a two day conference dedicated to the Hippie Trail and
related forms of alternative tourism.
Dates: 11-12 October, 2013
Venue: Cardiff Story Museum, The Old Library Trinity St, Cardiff, CF10
1BH, United Kingdom.
One of the last great expressions of alternative tourism in the
twentieth century, the hippie trail to Morocco, Afghanistan, Nepal,
India and other points east, flourished between 1957 (when Jack
Kerouac published his influential road narrative On the Road) and 1978
(when the Iranian Revolution closed the land route from Europe to
India). North American and European travellers used VW vans,
motorbikes and Land Rovers to travel East. Their exploits quickly
became a media clich: in popular consciousness, knowledge of the hippy
trail is still based mainly on stereotypical stories and images. Hard
facts are more difficult to ascertain. Who were these travellers? What
was the catalyst for their journeys? What routes did they take? What
forms of transport did they use? What impact did they make on the
local population, and vice versa? What was the scale of this movement?
What is the enduring legacy of these alternative forms of tourism?
We invite proposals on the hippie trail or related topics raising
analogous questions concerning power, globalization and cross-cultural
encounters. Possible topics include: spirituality and tourism;
discussion of relevant key texts; sites of alternative tourism (e.g.
Glastonbury Tor, Stonehenge, Pere Lachaise Cemetery, the Alhambra
Palace, the Buddhist statues at Bamiyan); sites of religious tourism
and pilgrimage (Lourdes, Jerusalem, Mecca); ecological tourism;
tourism, imperialism and Orientalism; the economic impact of various
forms of tourism.
At the end of the conference we intend to hold a round table
discussion in which ex-travellers will share their experiences.
Please submit proposals as a single file (.doc, .docx, or .pdf)
including your name, institutional affiliation (if appropriate) and
email address, as well as the title of your contribution, a note on
whether you prefer to contribute to a panel of academic papers or to a
roundtable discussion, and an abstract of approx. 200 words to
[log in to unmask] or [log in to unmask] by
June 14th, 2013.
Dr. Brian Ireland
History Division
School of Humanities and Social Sciences
University of South Wales
Pontypridd, Wales CF37 1DL
Email: [log in to unmask]
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