The Study of Tourism: Anthropological and Sociological Beginnings (Tourism Social Science Series) (Tourism Social Science Series)

"This will become a very important publication in the field of tourism. It is unique." - Jafar Jafari, Series Editor. The aim of the book is to use personal histories of pioneers to describe and analyze the emergence of tourism study among anthropologically oriented scholars (those acting as informants among the earliest to work on the subject of tourism and continue still). The editor, besides contributing his own personal history and the introductory chapters 1 and 2, has included a concluding analytic chapter that will make some general sense out of the comments of the participating informants. Dr. Nash is a well recognised scholar in the fields of anthropology and tourism. The field of tourism studies is growing exponentially, and this book fits with this growth. It uses personal histories of pioneers to analyze tourism study. It contributes to literature in the growing field of tourism studies. It is well suited for upper-level undergraduates and graduate students but accessible for the general public. "The aim of this book is to reconstruct the early history of anthropological and sociological thinking about what has sometimes been thought of as a frivolous subject. In order to do this, the editor has made use of participating informants - anthropologists and sociologists - who have been pioneers in the field of tourism study. Because they have been involved since the beginning, and continue still, these pioneers are able to give us an insider's view of the development of a new field of study from the point of view of their particular disciplines, which are centrally situated as far as the social scientific study of tourism is concerned. Besides writing his own personal history, the editor, who himself, is a pioneer, has contributed probing introductory and concluding chapters, in which he gives an overview of the entire scholarly enterprise that makes up the field of tourism study. Because of its broad-ranging, multidisciplinary point of view, the book should provide essential background reading not only for specialists in the field, but also thoughtful others who would like to make sense of an enterprise, which as the book suggests, turns out to be not nearly as frivolous as previously imagined."--BOOK JACKET Aims to use personal histories of pioneers to describe and analyze the emergence of tourism study among anthropologically oriented scholars. This work is intended for upper-level undergraduates and graduate students, as well as for the general public