Jeffrey P. Miller

From Forbidden Fruit to the Goose That Lays Golden Eggs

Often compared with the Gold Rush, the marijuana industry is already a multibillion-dollar phenomenon and is expected to generate 22 billion dollars in sales in the United States by 2020. Two years have passed since the legalization of recreational marijuana begun in Colorado. This unprecedented change has created numerous business opportunities as well as legal and operational challenges for the hospitality and tourism industry. This article explores the legalization of recreational marijuana in terms of the tourism industry in Colorado and identifies several challenges found in the current marijuana-related literature in the context of hospitality and tourism research. We also present several research areas that could help hospitality and tourism researchers explore and contribute to the body of knowledge of this emerging market by using Colorado as a focal point. Future research on marijuana tourism is of great importance in that the rapid rise of this niche market creates the pressing challenges and promising opportunities for destinations. Such knowledge will only increase in importance as marijuana tourism continues to evolve as a special interest tourism segment.

Advancing Multicultural Education in Hospitality Education Through the Use of Food Studies Curricula

Administrators at institutions of higher learning are encouraging more classes and contexts in the area of multicultural education. Given the diversity of employees in the hospitality field, it can be argued that the needs for multicultural understanding and sensitivity are as great as in any other field. The emerging discipline of food studies may offer educators tools for enhancing multicultural understanding and education in their classrooms. The discipline of food studies is discussed and examples of how it might work in the hospitality classroom are given.

Jiternice and Kolache: Food and identity in Wilson, Kansas

A small town in north-central Kansas uses its ethnically Czech heritage, especially traditionally Czech food products, as a way to maintain personal and social identity and to encourage heritage tourism as a means of economic development. Wilson, Kansas, is a town with a significant proportion of its population that is ethnically Czech. The town is attempting to use this ethnic background and its historical nature to deal with economic and demographic problems caused by its location away from major transportation infrastructures and lack of large-scale employers. The residents are using elements of Czech ethnicity and historical identity to create useful social and personal identities in the face of the challenges created by their unique situation. We focus on the primary areas of the food served at the After-Harvest Czech Festival, the Midland Hotel, analysis of local cookbooks featuring Czech cooking, and changing meal patterns among local residents in order to examine the nature of the changing identity of the residents and the town. The four areas examined show the difference between the ways that ethnicity is performed in the public and private space and the way in which the Midland Hotel functions as a metaphor for the larger changes that are affecting the community.