Cows, Critters, and Kiwis: Building a research agenda that won't bore you to tears or drive you crazy

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Cows, Critters, and Kiwis Building a research
agenda that won't bore you to tears or drive you
crazy

• Nancy Gard McGehee, Ph.D.
• Associate Professor
• Hospitality and Tourism Management
• Virginia Tech

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Who Am I?

• Grew up on a farm along the Ohio River
• BS in Sports Management, Marshall University
• Health Club Mgt., Sports Medicine Clinic, and Pro
  Baseball, West Palm Beach, FL
• MS in PRTM, North Carolina State University
• ATRDC, Athens, WV
• MS and PhD in Sociology, Virginia Tech
• PRTM NCSU faculty 1999-2001
• HTM VT faculty since 2001

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ATRDC
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Who Am I?

• I am a Rural Sociologist, interested in many
  forms of Sustainable Tourism, particularly
  through the eyes of the Resident/Host.
• I believe that truly Sustainable Tourism must
  include a Socio-Cultural component.
• My ontological perspective I am a Critical
  Theorist, but love applying a variety of
  sociological theories to tourism.
• My methodological bent mixed-methods, but
• my belongs to Qualitative Methods.
• Currently, I am particularly interested in Social
  Capital as it pertains to Sustainability in a
  variety of forms of tourism.
• Forms of tourism that are currently capturing my
  interest Volunteer Tourism and Locally-Driven
  Rural Tourism.

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Socio-Cultural Impacts of Tourism

• Sustainable Rural Tourism Development

• Volunteer Tourism

• Craft Marketing Cooperatives
• Agri-tourism motivation cooperation
• Rural resident attitudes
• DMOs social capital
• Parkway Sustainable Tourism Project
• Rural tourism in the tropics social capital

• VT social movement participation
• VT and resident attitudes
• VT expectations
• Critical Theory VT
• VT social capital

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Virginia Agri-tourism (Cows)

• McGehee, N.G. and K. Kim (2004). Motivation for
  Agri-tourism Entrepreneurship. Journal of
  Travel Research, 432 161-170.
• N.G. McGehee K. Kim and G. Jennings (2007).
  Gender and Motivation for Agri-tourism
  Entrepreneurship. Tourism Management, 281
  (280-289).
• N.G. McGehee (2007). An Agri-Tourism Systems
  Model A Weberian Perspective. Journal of
  Sustainable Tourism. 152, 111-124.

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Agri-tourism Entrepreneurship

• VA farm families (survey, 412 of 987, 42)
• Webers formal and substantive rationality as
  framework for motivation
• Formal (primarily economic)
• Substantive (primarily socio-cultural)
• Most were motivated by a formal-substantive mix
  of motivations
• Additional income
• Fully utilize our resources
• Educate consumers
• A family-oriented hobby
• Motivations were most influenced by acres owned,
  dependence on farming, and household income

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Gender, Motivation, and Agri-tourism
Entrepreneurship

• Again, VA farm families
• Chiappe and Floras alternative agricultural
  paradigm
• Past research in A. A. focused on men and then
  was generalized for all Chiappe and Flora
  focused on women.
• A.A. Paradigm includes harmony with nature,
  independence, contribution to community,
  diversity of product. Could this perspective of
  A.A. also apply to agri-tourism?
• Paradigm based differences were not found, BUT
  women in this study reported to be more highly
  motivated to develop agri-tourism as a source of
  entrepreneurial enterprise than their male
  counter-parts.

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Agri-tourism Systems Model

• Back to Webers rationality!
• Research unearthed problems, the big picture
• Lack of communication between agri-tourism
  providers, DMOs, and agri-tourists
• Lack of understanding across the three groups
  creates obstacles to strong relationships
• Webers formal-substantive rationality could
  contextualize the relationships

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Figure 1 An Agri-Tourism Systems Model
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Rocky Knob BRP NPS Project

• Development of a sustainable tourism centerpiece
  project and regional sustainable tourism plan for
  the Rocky Knob region of the Blue Ridge Parkway
• Research framework that included
• Community asset and resource inventory
• Community and stakeholder input
• Survey of current visitors
• Land use suitability and tourism scenario
  development
• Survey of potential visitors
• Economic impact analysis of recommended scenarios

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Slingin concrete

• McGehee, N.G. (2002). Alternative Tourism and
  Social Movement Participation. Annals of Tourism
  Research, 291, 124-143.
• McGehee, N.G. and W.C. Norman (2002).
  Alternative Tourism as Impetus for
  Consciousness-Raising. Tourism Analysis, 63/4,
  239-251.
•  McGehee, N.G. and C. Santos (2005). Social
  Change, Discourse, and Volunteer Tourism. Annals
  of Tourism Research, 323, 760-779.
• McGehee, N.G. and Andereck, K. (2008) Pettin
  the Critters Exploring the complex relationship
  between volunteers and the voluntoured in
  McDowell County, WV, USA and Tijuana, Mexico in
  S. Wearing and K. Lyons (eds) Journeys of
  Discovery in Volunteer Tourism International
  Case Study Perspectives. CABI, Oxfordshire, UK.
•  McGehee, N.G. and Andereck, K. (2009). Volunteer
  Tourism and the Voluntoured The case of
  Tijuana, Mexico. Journal of Sustainable
  Tourism, 171 (39-54).
• Andereck, K., McGehee, N.G., Lee, S. and Clemmons
  D. (in press). Experience expectations of
  prospective volunteer tourists. Journal of
  Travel Research.
• McGehee, N.G. (accepted with revisions).
  Oppression, emancipation, and volunteer
  tourism, Annals of Tourism Research.

Resident Attitudes and Voluntourism (Critters)
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Pettin the Critters

• Comparative case study of the relationship
  between voluntourists and the voluntoured in
  Tijuana, Mexico and McDowell Co., WV
• Mixed methods
• Interviews (formal and informal)
• Questionnaires
• Web site content analysis
• Participant observation
• Two major themes emerged
• Dependency
• The role of organized religion
• And one great story emerged
• Pettin the critters

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Oppression, emancipation, and volunteer tourism

• Application of critical theory and social
  movement theory to volunteer tourism
• Recognizing the contradictions of volunteer
  tourism through research propositions
• oppressor-emancipator?
• dependency perpetuator or self-efficacy
  empowerer?
• resource abuser or resource mobilizer?
• network creator or agitator?
• stereotype perpetuator or consciousness-raiser?
• The ultimate question how can we find ways to
  use volunteer tourism to further social change?

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The Voluntourism Critical Theory Model
Volunteer tourism discourse
Dominant Hegemony (current systems of power and
status quo)
The Social Construction of Volunteer Tourism
Level of volunteer tourism organizations actions
working to equalize power inequalities between
hosts and guests (economic, social,
environmental) and therefore facilitate
emancipation of the voluntoured
Level of human emancipation included as part of
a volunteer tourism organizations goals
Actual degree of equality between the local
community and volunteers (economic ,social,
environmental) environmental)
Opportunities for Human emancipation of the
voluntourist (working and middle class, the
proletariat)
Level of Human emancipation
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The Voluntourism Social Movement Theory Model
Self-Efficacy
Network Facilitation between volunteers and the
voluntoured
Social Movement Participation
Resource Mobilization
Volunteer Tourism Participation
Network Facilitation amongst volunteers
Volunteer Tourism Participation
Social Change
Social Change
Consciousness-raising experience
Personal as Political
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NZ Project (Kiwis)

• A slightly different direction, but the same
  purpose
• Cultivating community capital through volunteer
  tourism
• Project with Anne Zahra, Waikato Mgt. School,
  Hamilton, NZ, targeting volunteer tourism in the
  Philippines
• Examining the potential for volunteer tourism to
  form a framework for the introduction of bridging
  social capital as well as create opportunities
  for internal bonding social capital within the
  volunteer tourism host community and subsequently
  exploring how these bridging and bonding social
  capital networks exert an influence on other
  forms of capital financial, natural, political,
  cultural, built, and human, within the host
  community.
• Exploring the use of appreciative inquiry as a
  method

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Some projects dont always fitor do they?

• Virginia and North Carolina Legislatures
  Opinions of Tourism
• The Quiet Good (CSR and the Lodging Industry)
• Creation of a Statewide Tourism Development Plan
  for Virginia

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A great research agenda needs to

• Inspire both you and others
• Be something you feel passionate about but still
  pays the bills
• Pass the elevator speech test
• Be flexible
• Be trackable and tangible (think key words)
• Find its way into your teaching and service
  activities
• Be the foundation for a career that you can be
  proud of
• NOT be stagnantconsistent doesnt mean boring!
• Encourage you to become a bricoleur

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Other Strategies and Suggestions?