Please see below the request for a research assistant.
Please reply directly to Stephen Katz at [log in to unmask]
Linda Peake
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Hi Linda,
I've been thinking about a research assistant for next summer to work on
part of SSHRC project I've developed; this part to do with aging,
recreation, Elderhostel. More specifically, what I'm looking for is
somebody who would have a desire to learn more about (Canadian) Elderhostel
and "eldering social spaces". Elderhostel is usually written about as one
of those burgeoning enterprises that represent growing retiree affluence,
independence and mobility. Hence it is rightfully championed as a wave of
the future for the leisure/travel culture, but less work has been done on
how retirees actually affect the places they go to -- in other words we
study what happens to the people not what happens to the Elderhostel
places themselves (if anything). What kinds of spatial and recreational
transformations occur during an Elderhostel course? What kinds of local
effects take place? What traces are left behind? How are Elderhostel
spaces "eldered" and brought into the geography of the retirement world?
How does Elderhostel both participate in and challenge the commercialization
of seniors' culture?
These questions might be addressed through an on-site ethnographic type of
program, joining a group, or two groups, doing some interviews and doing a
sociological-spatial analysis of Elderhostel culture "on location". There
are groups that go everywhere at various times of the year. I have funding,
not unlimited and part-time to support this research which would be part of
my larger SSHRC project on "Cultures of Aging and the Postmodern
Lifecourse", though the ideal would be working with somebody with a
(growing) background in spatial/leisure/cultural/aging studies and whose
involvement would be useful and beneficial to their own research and/or
graduate work.
Do you have any ideas?
Thanks, Stephen.
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Stephen Katz,
Associate Professor,
Department of Sociology,
Trent University,
Peterborough, Ontario
K9J 7B8.
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