Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
highway crossings, highway motels and international airports.
(Høyer, 2009, p65)
The guiding philosophy of slow then is partly an antithesis to fast, but there
is also a connectedness with ecology and sustainable development which
comes from an interest in locality and place as well as from strands of green
travel. This is not articulated in any way as a school of thought to which we
might refer. The ideas have been unfolded by an eclectic mix of writers, advo-
cates and scholars during the past two decades. Nevertheless, there are several
recurrent themes and values present in the literature that can be summarized
as:
1
slow equates to quality time
2
it is about physically slowing down to enjoy what is on offer
3
a quality experience
4
meaning and engagement
5
in tune with ecology and diversity.
Other characteristics relating to slow travel include the avoidance of staged
authenticity, if that is ever possible, for some would argue that tourism is
about performance and contestation of space (Mordue, 2005). In the moving
space, slow travel is also about a critical appreciation of the journey and with
an underlying value that travel need not impact heavily on the environment.
Some of these elements have been codified as a set of guiding principles for the
tourist, such as one provided by Jenner and Smith (2008). This is an example
of several topics which exhort the tourist to adopt green travel modes, but also
encourage the reader to enjoy a place by taking on the mindset of the slow
traveller: it is a perception about how to engage with both the travel element
and the destination. For example, tourists are encouraged to choose destina-
tions nearer to home, to travel by environmentally sensitive modes and select
accommodation that has minimal environmental impact.
MacCannell (1989), in his seminal work,
The Tourist
, recollects that all
tourists seek much the same, regardless of the form of tourism, although
he makes little reference to environmental consciousness. But do they?
Segmentation is more prevalent than hitherto; there is a multitude of values in
the market and this renders it more difficult to portray the tourist in a set of
neat typologies. Even the slow traveller cannot be categorized as one discrete
market segment; there are shades of green (Dickinson et al, 2010a). Some
tourists look for more than others, and with an intensity of experience that is
widely different to the most casual holiday participant. Those seeking slow-
ness in their holidays have been described as a niche market, prevalent in
Europe (especially in Italy), and North America, but it is far more widespread
than this.
As discussed before, the concept of slow has been considered more widely
in the context of gastronomy and cultural heritage than in relation to the act
of travel per se. The early work was pioneered in the 1980s by Petrini, the
founder of the Slow Food movement located in Italy, but the concept has now
