scholarly journals Sustainable Management of Popular Culture Tourism Destinations: A Critical Evaluation of the Twilight Saga Servicescapes

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (12) ◽  
pp. 5177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine Lundberg ◽  
Kristina N. Lindström

Popular culture tourism destinations are made up of constructed realities transforming local communities into fictional servicescapes. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate how the unpacking of a key concept (servicescape), applied to destination management, can support the transition to sustainable destination development in the face of popular culture tourism. The aim is to unpack the servicescape concept by exploring how it is constructed focusing on Twilight Saga representations and production processes at four destinations. The data consists of photographs and video clips of the servicescapes and interviews with key stakeholders. The findings support previous servicescape research dimensions and elements but also identify critical areas of power, control, and conflict when introducing a process approach to the servicescape concept. The study provides insights into the complex exchanges that take place in the development of servicescapes at popular culture tourism destinations. The study thereby contributes to an elaborated and holistic servicescape model, stressing the importance of strategic design and local stakeholders’ early involvement in the preproduction of popular culture tourism phenomena.

2021 ◽  
pp. 019459982110042
Author(s):  
Jenny X. Chen ◽  
Shivani A. Shah ◽  
Vinay K. Rathi ◽  
Mark A. Varvares ◽  
Stacey T. Gray

Graduate medical education (GME) is funded by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services through both direct and indirect payments. In recent years, stakeholders have raised concerns about the growth of spending on GME and distribution of payment among hospitals. Key stakeholders have proposed reforms to reduce GME funding such as adjustments to statutory payment formulas and absolute caps on annual payments per resident. Otolaryngology departmental leadership should understand the potential effects of proposed reforms, which could have significant implications for the short-term financial performance and the long-term specialty workforce. Although some hospitals and departments may elect to reduce resident salaries or eliminate positions in the face of GME funding cuts, this approach overlooks the substantial Medicare revenue contributed by resident care and high cost of alternative labor sources. Commitment to resident training is necessary to align both the margin and mission of otolaryngology departments and their sponsoring hospitals.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-47
Author(s):  
Natalie Schilling

This article presents an exploration of the discourse-level phenomenon known as ‘backwards talk’ in Smith Island, a small, endangered dialect community in Maryland’s Chespaeake Bay, on the U.S. mid-Atlantic coast. The article examines how backwards talk, basically pervasive, highly creative irony, compares with irony more generally; how it patterns across generations and contexts; how important it is to island residents, who view backwards talk as the defining feature of their dialect; and why the feature has gained such importance in the face of dialect loss - and potential loss of community continuity as well. Because backwards talk is irony, it has important solidarity functions. As playful, nonliteral language, it serves as a symbol of the performed ‘islandness’ that islanders increasingly take up as they come into more and more contact with outsiders. Finally, as a means of offering critical evaluation of outsiders, backwards talk can be seen as a form of anti-language or counterlanguage, with a central function of resistance against outside forces.


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Buck

Historically, drag is a taboo which has been marginalized in the face of centuries of repression against non-heteronormative activity. Yet today drag has become highly visible in popular culture, and this is in large part attributable to the international success of American reality TV show RuPaul’s Drag Race (2009-present). Its bold representation of drag on a mainstream television show is unprecedented and the selection of drag queen competitors by the show’s producers has demonstrated a plethora of representations as Drag Race showcases a diverse range of identifications from the world of drag performance. The blossoming of Drag Race’s success comes at a historical moment in which we are seeing a huge proliferation of queer representations (re)produced in US television and other media over the last decade. However, as I will argue, the apparent liberalization of drag queens in popular culture is not simply a celebration of so-called ‘progress’ in the recognition of the marginalized, but may also be prompting the promotion of other value changes within late capitalism’s ideals of consumerism and entrepreneurship. Contestants are increasingly pressured to construct their drag performances to conform to a recognizable brand to reach the heights of their own private ‘success’. Mainstreamed depictions of queer subjects are susceptible to co-option, particularly in televisual forms such as Drag Race which prospers by channelling the emancipatory and subversive desires of the subculture. Through trans-textual considerations and historical contextualizations, I show how the representation of drag in Drag Race is depoliticized through neoliberal discourse as the show’s continual demand for competitors to ‘work it’ privileges and maintains the impetus for competitive profitmaking above the needs and demands of disempowered groups.


2014 ◽  
pp. 1604-1622
Author(s):  
Don Olcott

The rapid increase in internationalism and borderless higher education by public and for-profit universities is changing the face of the global higher education landscape. Today, universities have more opportunities for serving campus-based international students and extending their programs and research on the international stage. Students also have more choices than ever before in navigating their educational future and are becoming active consumers of global HE. Language, culture, and social norms are as critical as any educational strategies used to build and sustain international partnerships. An understanding, tolerance, and humility about the educational process in other countries is a necessity for building successful partnerships. Borderless higher education is highly complex and involves various risks for colleges and universities and the need to justify foreign ventures or adventures to key stakeholders at home. The “new global regionalism” will accelerate HE competition for students, and the global destination choices for students may drive more students to remain in their region than going to traditional destinations such as the US, UK, and Australia. Universities will function more like businesses, and their foreign partnerships and campus international recruitment will be based on leveraging profitable revenues to supplement their composite educational enterprise. This will be accentuated by reduced government funding and the need to temper continuous tuition and fee increases. Quality assurance agencies will exert greater pressure on universities to maintain accountability, program standards, and alignment with their core mission. University chief executives will need to navigate a range of complex issues before leading their universities into unchartered international waters. Indeed, some universities have no business in the business of borderless higher education. This chapter explores borderless higher education.


2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 40-50
Author(s):  
Anamaria Vrabie ◽  
Monica Dudian

The COVID-19 pandemic has added an unforeseen layer of adversity to city life, refocusing the attention of local governments on urban resilience. This article discusses the innovative design proposed by a Romanian public sector innovation lab: a multi-fold qualitative approach that collects coping strategies from a wide range of local stakeholders and works towards understanding how they can be transformed in sustainable practices for crisis moments. It also provides interim lessons learned from designing the intervention.


2020 ◽  
pp. 004208592095490
Author(s):  
Julia Daniel ◽  
Hui-Ling Sunshine Malone ◽  
David E. Kirkland

In this article, we explore community schools, as first theorized through community organizing, in relation to movements for racial justice in education to address the following question: How has educational equity been radically imagined by the community school movement in New York City to reframe how we understand success, meaningful school experiences, and the possibility for hope, healing, and racial equity in education? Using ethnographic methods, we answer this question by examining what went into the grassroots commitments of organizers and the grasstops implementation of the community schools’ strategy at the district level. This examination sets a context for exploring what we saw happening at the school level, where we observed community meetings with organizers and district officials and interviewed key stakeholders about their deep histories of advocating for equitable reform. Drawing on an abolitionist paradigm, we describe how organizers such as those in NYC, who were interested in transforming systems as a prerequisite to advancing freedom, were the first major advocates of the original community schools project. Valuing the knowledge and strength of communities that have survived and thrived in the face of centuries of oppression, we conclude that community stakeholders in collaboration with education workers, from organizers to students, envisioned a blurring of communities and schools as part of a strategy to build collective power that both exposes and challenges injustice.


2019 ◽  
Vol 74 (4) ◽  
pp. 902-914 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xabier Barandiarán ◽  
Natalia Restrepo ◽  
Álvaro Luna

Purpose This paper aims to examine through a case study how the creation of collaborative spaces between local stakeholders can foster decision-making and collective development of projects that improve the governance of tourism destinations and their sustainability. Design/methodology/approach The paper focuses on the analysis of a case study based on the Etorkizuna Eraikiz (Building the Future) programme developed in the Gipuzkoa region located in the Basque Country, Spain. The programme is based on a strategy that seeks to institutionalize a new model of collaborative governance in the long term through the co-design of public policies involving stakeholders of the territory. Through the description and analysis of the results achieved so far, the paper presents the implications of this public programme for the design of policies. Findings Etorkizuna Eraikiz emerges as a model to develop an exercise of active experimentation. The analysis of this collaborative governance process has derived in practices and agendas promoted by a variety of agents within the region. The programme has important implications for the formulation of public policies in the field of tourism through the creation of formal interaction spaces and the implementation of projects in support of tourism development (Tourist Eco-tax and information and communication technology tools). Originality/value This paper provides a contemporary approach to the practices in governance within the context of tourism. This case study may be of interest to practitioners and researchers to adopt destination governance practices through the creation of collaborative spaces between local stakeholders. These practices can foster decision-making and the collective development of projects that impact and lead to better governance of tourism destinations and their sustainability.


English Today ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 56-62 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jae Jung Song

One of the major achievements of Braj Kachru's (1991) ‘liberation linguistics’ is that it has squarely placed Outer Circle varieties such as Indian English, Nigerian English and Singaporean English on a par with Inner Circle varieties such as American English and British English – in the face of negative attitudes, ranging ‘from amused condescension to racist stereotyping’ (Bruthiaux, 2003: 160). Following in Kachru's footsteps, many scholars have demonstrated that these Outer Circle Englishes are legitimate varieties of English, with distinct characteristics and with growing numbers of native speakers (e.g. Deterding, 2007; Jowitt, 1991; Sailaja, 2009). Indeed these Outer Circle English varieties are increasingly used, in respective countries, not only as the major or default medium of communication but also in the context of important domains such as education, media, government, literature and popular culture. The Kachruvian perspective has also given rise to the ‘egalitarian’ view that Inner Circle English speakers are no longer the only ones who can lay claim to the ownership of English. Outer Circle English speakers are now thought to be as much custodians of English as Inner Circle English speakers are.


2008 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 305-318 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Courtney ◽  
Malcom Moseley

The determinants of local economic performance have provided a focus for theoretical debate and posed a conundrum for rural policy makers aiming to address local and regional disparities in the face of global competitiveness. The complex interrelationship of potential explanatory factors is conceptualized in terms of five ‘capitals’: economic, human, social, environmental and cultural. Findings from in-depth interviews with local stakeholders in eight English districts emphasise the interplay between local historical and cultural contexts, the capacity of local actors to stimulate development and the potential to create ‘open’ economies and societies in explaining uneven patterns of performance across rural England.


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