Blackwell's Companions to Geography series continues with this volume on tourism. Tourism studies is an interdisciplinary field and the editors have sought contributions on what they perceive as the major research and theoretical subjects from leading academics, who write from a geographical perspective (Preface p. xvii). The list of contributors (pp. ix‐xv) includes eminent academics in the field.
This Companion to Tourism is one of the more substantial volumes in the series. The book is organized into nine parts, which perhaps reflects the breadth and diversity within tourism studies. The editors’ introduction and conclusions are separate parts, but it might be useful to read both of these sections first, and particularly the conclusion that refers back to specific chapters and might help initially guide the reader.
It is also recommended that part two be read next. This examines the different theoretical approaches to tourism studies that contributors write from in later sections. There are, for instance, excellent contributions on political economy, textual analysis and practice and performance that breakdown the dichotomy of production/economy and consumption/culture approaches to the subject.
The remaining six sections cover a number of substantive themes. Section three explores the production of tourism spaces, while section four looks at local contestations of globalisation and section five considers the values and practices of tourists. Section six examines the places and spaces of tourism, before focusing on different forms of tourism, such as rural tourism, second homes, gambling and event tourism (for example World Cup football, the Olympics and so forth). Section seven discusses the staple theme of tourism and the environment from social constructivist and resource management perspectives. This is complemented by the next section on policy and planning at different spatial scales of regional, national and sub‐national.
Certain sections are more focused than others. Part three, for example, explores the role of different “actors” in the production of tourism spaces at different spatial scales from transnational companies, small business enterprises, information, communication and technology, labour and transport.
These contributions are positioned between an argument for an economic geography of tourism and a paper on the general model of the tourism area life cycle. Similarly, the first two contributions in part seven discuss nature as the tourist's object of desire, followed by contributions on tourism's environmental impact and issues of sustainability.
Other sections convey the breadth of research interests and theoretical concerns. Part five, for example, includes contributions on typologies of tourist motivations, tourism and the formation of (post‐)modern subjectivity, travel writing as producing imagined geographies and ethnographies of travel experience and (changing) tourist behaviour, a feminist critique of tourist research and alternative embodied research practice, and the convergence of tourism and consumption.
Given its substantive themes, this Companion will satisfy a broad readership in tourism studies from advanced undergraduate level onwards, and is particularly relevant to geographers with different interests (economic, cultural, political to name a few). In addition, the substantive themes and contributions cover typically staple parts of tourism studies and it is therefore a good general reference for many teaching courses and modules. Moreover, each contribution is complete with endnotes as necessary and a full bibliography and can be singly referenced.
Unfortunately, the bibliographies are not consolidated at the end of the relevant part or the volume. Neither is the index at the back as extensive or as useful as it could be. Despite this, the book is probably a good buy for students and researchers in the tourism field.
