Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
work must be professionally presented, being easy to read, targeted at the audience
intending to read it, and precise and unambiguous.
• Even where the client is a non-paying customer (i.e. if the research is undertaken as a
contribution to the local community), such criteria are equally important. Otherwise,
the outside world's image of the geographer will remain one of the ivory tower
academic perceived as being distant from the real world and problem-solving
contributions they can make. Likewise, academics need to be willing to incorporate
changes on drafts and to recognise that in this environment their view is not
necessarily without reproach. This is nowhere more the case than in recreation and
tourism where an explicit business dimension is incorporated into such research.
It is fair to agree with Doornkamp's (1982:26) analogy that practising geographers left
the discipline in the immediate post-war period and joined the commercial world, calling
themselves planners. A similar move may be occurring in recreation and tourism, with
the movement of staff to business schools and specialist tourism and/or recreation
departments either from academic positions in departments of geography or after
completion of their graduate studies. The 'professional practice' side of the discipline of
geography has continued to lose out to other disciplines even when its skills are more
relevant and analytical. Interfacing with the real world has meant that a small proportion
of recreation and tourism geographers have made a steady transition to professional
practice without compromising their academic integrity and reputation. While payment
for their services may have filled some of their peers and contemporaries with horror,
recreation and tourism are commercial activities. In some cases, not using the label
'geographer' can have a great deal of benefit when interfacing with recreation and
tourism businesses, since the public perception of geographers is not of practitioners
making commercial or social contributions to society. So in summary, it is clear that
applied geography problem-solving in recreation and tourism contexts can enhance the
geographer's skills and relationship with society. In the longer term, it may help address
the public image of the discipline as one of major value to research in applied fields such
as tourism.
But ultimately the main barrier to geographers using their skills for an applied purpose
is their own willingness and ability to interface in commercial and public contexts where
they can be heard, listened to, taken seriously and their skills harnessed. In many cases,
there is often a belated recognition of the value of such skills when a client uses such a
person. Therefore, the public face of geography can be enhanced only if it embraces
recreation and tourism as legitimate subdisciplines of a post-industrial society/geography
that can have a major contribution to make in various applied contexts.
THE ROLE OF GIS AND TOURISM: A TOOL FOR APPLIED
GEOGRAPHIC RESEARCH
GIS, developed by advances in computer hardware and software (such as Arclnfo),
incorporates more sophisticated systems to search, query, present and analyse data in a
spatial context. Table 10.2 outlines the capabilities of a GIS and its role in enabling
geographers to assist decision-makers in making planning decisions. In fact, Butler
(1992) outlined some of the possible problem-solving roles of GIS in tourism as shown in
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