Majella Sweeney

My Home Is My Castle: Defiance of the Commercial Homestay Host in Tourism

The intrinsic nature of small tourism business provision has rarely been captured in previous literature, but it has recently gained momentum within scholarly discourse exploring the role of the “home” in tourism and hospitality. This article contributes an examination of the commercial homestay host in New Zealand with a particular focus on the hosts’ personal relationship with their “commercial home.” The article reports the findings of in-depth interviews conducted with commercial homestay hosts in New Zealand. Findings allude to the tyranny of the homestay hosts in their tourism hosting role, their oppressive social need, self-marginalization, and distinctive identity—one that is notably defiant of other commercial hospitality and tourism business norms. In contrast, previous studies rarely showcase the personal perspectives, conscious defiance, or marginalization of commercial hospitality provision. Consequences for understanding the tourism and hospitality phenomenon of commercial home hosting are thus discussed.

Explorations of the host's relationship with the commercial home

This paper investigates the hosts relationship with their commercial home and its influences on product construction. Intangible dimensions of hospitality are explored through interviews and photographs. Commercial home hosts are interviewed using photographs taken of their property to investigate the relationship they have with their commercial home, deepening our understanding of the host—home relationship, leading to a more sophisticated and nuanced appreciation of how the commercial home ‘home’ product is constructed. The study is based on six commercial homes units. It is envisaged that in the future further issues will be identified from additional unit studies. A selection of themes is identified from preliminary analysis and areas for future research are suggested. The outcome of this research will include a deeper understanding of the commercial home product construction and the commercial home sector itself, which may lead to recommendations contributing towards the nature of quality assurance and grading systems, training and development strategies appropriate to the commercial home concept, and potential implications of marketing. This research is distinguished from what has gone before as prior studies have focused on readily accessible ‘objective’ issues, rather than below the surface issues accessing the inner self, the intangible dimensions of self, which nevertheless may determine aspects of the hospitality product.

Classifying Commercial Home Hosts Based on their Relationships to the Home

This paper reports on a study which investigates the host–home relationship within the commercial home, and proposes a typology of commercial home hosts. Previous studies have identified types of small business owners and home owners and here more specifically to the hospitality context, a host categorisation is explored. The relationship of the host to their commercial home is explored using interviews, observations and discussions of the relationship facilitated by photographs of the property. Findings identify five types of commercial home hosts: the economic host, the eco-socio host, the socio-eco host, the social host and the ego host. The typology is explained and discussed.

Accessibility, Inclusion, and Diversity in Critical Event Studies

Local authorities are increasingly turning to festivals to try to encompass difference by creating welcoming, inclusive, and accessible communities. However, scholars have critiqued this notion, arguing that rather than encouraging diversity, such festivals may rather reproduce and disguise power relationships, leading not to increased tolerance, but rather to tensions and heightened differences. This chapter uses the concept of ‘encounter’ to draw together common themes that have emerged from the many studies of festivals that the authors have undertaken. The chapter initially identifies that ‘community’ is a contested term; therefore, festivals and events that rely solely on place-based conceptualisations of community are potentially marginalising other forms of community. Secondly, the chapter draws attention to the ‘paradox of difference’. For example, while multicultural festivals may be staged to increase tolerance of diversity, such festivals may actually be contributing to disharmony or divergence by positioning different cultures as ‘the other’. Similarly, festivals that bring an increased awareness of classed, educational, and financial divides in a community may actually be highlighting disadvantage. Festivals may increase meaningful social encounters and interactions, but they need to be planned and managed carefully to ensure such positive outcomes are realised.

An exploration of mixed research methods in planned event studies

ABSTRACT The Fife Council in Scotland facilitated the development of 400 events in 2010. Six different and complementary research methodologies were utilized to evaluate these events. The research required the use of a range of quantitative and qualitative methods to establish the motives, feelings and well-being that impacted these events. Crowd counts, ethnography, semi-structured interviews, ethno-photography, focus panels, and electronic surveys were combined. The research demonstrates the potential for using mixed research methods to evaluate different planned events and depicts innovative methods for measuring the overall effectiveness of planned events from the organizational, as well as an individual, participant perspective.