Tourism Landscapes and Luxury Consumption Conference, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Workshop organised by the Departamento de Análisis Geográfico Regional y Geografía Física, Facultad de Geografía e Historia. UCM, Spain; Departamento de Antropología Social, Facultad de CC. Políticas y Sociología. UCM, Spain and 'mediterranean mobilities' - CeMoRe, Lancaster University, UK

Jonathan V. Beaverstock, University of Nottingham, UK. 'Locating the Global-super Rich in Contemporary Globalization'

Ghislain Dubois, Executive Director, TEC Consultants / Associate Professor, Versailles University, France. 'Tourism and Climate Change: Luxury and Inequality in the Access to mobility'

Pau Obrador, Sunderland University, UK. 'Dreams of luxury, Mediterranean Tourism and Bio-politics'

Rothanti Tzanelli, Leeds University, UK. 'The DaVinci Node: between 'Staged Cosmopolitanism' and Democratised Consumption'

Ana García Silberman, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico. 'A taste for a distinctive Caribbean: Exclusive Tourism in Yucatán's Haciendas'

Mimi Sheller, Swarthmore University, USA. 'Sim-City-sur-Mer: Virtual Islands, Tourism Mobilities, and the Offshore Caribbean'

Signs of conspicuous ostentation proliferate along Caribbean and Mediterranean landscapes. Megayachts, private islands, ultra-expensive mansions, luxury hotels, and exclusive restaurants and country clubs speak of the prominence these regions are gainning in the transnational lifestyles of the super-rich. Luxury has been no stranger to places like Antigua, Belize, Bahamas, Barbados, St Tropez, Mallorca, or Monte Carlo in the 20th century. Yet the scale and geographical scope of recent developments are a reflection of the rapid polarisation of wealth in the last two decades and the rising number of individuals engrossing the lists of the multi-millionaire, mega-rich and billionaire (increase of 200,000 people in 2003 totalling 7.3 million globally). Social scientists are beginning to map out the spaces and practices of the super-rich in metropolitan areas of industrial countries and examine their significance in altering city landscapes. Understanding these mobile elites requires also a closer escrutiny of their transnational lifestyles and the constelation of places interconnected through their consumption patterns.

This workshop will examine luxury consumption in the Caribbean and the Mediterranean paying particular attention to the wider social, economic and environmental implications of elite lifestyles and their role in articulating flows of people, images, fantasies, objects and money.The Caribbean and the Mediterranean are particularly interesting areas for the study of the new high-earners. The democratisation of tourism in the postwar period partially eclypsed their earlier image as playgrounds of elite consumption and witnessed the emergence of discourses about their environmental destruction in the hands of herd-like tourists. Today their image of places spoiled by mass tourism co-exists in stark contrast with landscaped enclavic resorts evoking a sense of distinction and ecology. This should not be seen as a completely new trend. Mass tourism has always involved a paradoxical combination of narratives about accessibility and the democratization of travel along with unavoidable rounds of distinction games. Yet an interesting question in the age of the risk society and global resource scarcity is the way in which the rising aspirations and 'luxury fever' of the middle classes animated by the extravagant lifestyles of the super-rich are being negotiated with concerns about environmental limits.

The Workshop will be held in the Institute for Advanced Studies Rooms 2/3 at Lancaster University on 11-12 September. A few places are still available. The regular registration fee is £50 and the unwaged registration fee is £25 to include all meeting costs, lunch on both days and tea/coffee. There will be a dinner in Lancaster on the night of the 11th (not covered by the registration fees). Please let us know if you would like to attend. If required, a range of overnight accommodation is available at own cost in Lancaster.

Conference Programme

PRELIMINARY VERSION

Thursday, 11th September

11.30 - 12.15 - Welcome and registration.Coffee, tea and sandwiches will be provided.

12.15 - 12.30 - Introduction - Matilde Córdoba, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Javier Caletrío, CeMoRe

12.30 - 1.30 - 'Locating the Global-super Rich in Contemporary Globalization' - Jonathan Beaverstock, University of Nottingham

Luxury and the Media (13.30 - 16.20)

13.30 - 14.30 - 'The DaVinci Node: Between 'Staged Cosmopolitanism' and Democratised Consumption?' - Rodanthi Tzanelli, Leeds University

14.30 - 15 - 'Luxury Tourism with a Post-colonial Flavour' - Karen Wilkes, University of East London

15 - 15.20 - Coffee / Tea

15.20 - 15.50 - 'Disparaging the Noddy Boats, Aspiring to Mrs David: Tensions in BBC Television's Rick Stein's French Odyssey' - David Dunn, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh

15.50 - 16. 20 - 'Silence is Golden: Linguascaping and Social/spatial Exclusion in Elite Tourism Representations.' - Crispin Thurlow, University of Washington, Adam Jaworski, Cardiff University

16.20 - 17.30 - 'Dreams of Luxury, Mediterranean Tourism and Bio-politics' - Pau Obrador, Sunderland University

19 - Dinner at The Gatehouse, Lancaster

Friday, 12th September

9 - 10 - Coffee / Tea

10 - 11 - 'Tourism and Climate Change : Luxury and Inequality in the Access to Mobility' - Ghislain Dubois, TEC Consultants / Versailles University, France

Landscapes of luxury (11-15.05)

11 - 12 - 'Sim-City-sur-Mer: Virtual Islands, Tourism Mobilities, and the Offshore Caribbean' - Mimi Sheller, Swarthmore University, USA

12 - 13 - 'A Taste for a Distinctive Caribbean: Exclusive Tourism in Yucatán's Haciendas' - Ana García Silberman, Universidad Autónoma de Mexico, Matilde Córdoba, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

13 - 13.45 - Lunch

13.45 - 14. 25 - 'Golf in Spain: The Social and Territorial Concentration of a Phenomenon that Extensively Transcends the Sport' - Frank Babinger, Universidad Complutense de Madrid

14. 25 - 15.05 - 'View for the Few: Urban Ethnography on the Production of Real Estate Environments. The case of Tigné (Sliema, Malta)' - Marc Morrell, Universitat Illes Balears

15.05 - 15. 45 - 'Reassessing Luxury and Excess' - John Urry, CeMoRe

15.45 - 16.30 - Group discussion

Invited speakers

Jon Beaverstock is Professor of Economic Geography at the University of Nottingham. He has co-directed the Globalization and World Cities Study Group and Network. He has published extensively on globalization and world cities, the relational geographies of European and Asian-Pacific international financial centres, skilled international labour migration, expatriation and business travel in a digital age, and the geographies of the super-rich.

Ghislain Dubois is executive director of TEC Consultants and has researched extensively on tourism, transport and climate change working with future scenarios. His research has a strong connection to global environmental policies and he is a regular adviser of international bodies (UNESCO, UNWTO, UNEP Blue Plan).

Pau Obrador is a lecturer at Sunderland University. His research interests include cultural geographies of the beach, mass Mediterranean tourism, embodiment and sensuality, post-structural thinking and tourism, the changing nature of tourist subjectivities and the performance of tourist spaces. He is curently co-editing with Mike Crang a book on the cultures of Mediterranean mass tourism.

Rothanti Tzanelli, Deputy Director of the Centre for Ethnicity & Racism Studies, University of Leeds University. One of her research interest is the relationship between the tourist and cinematic industries. Her book 'The cinematic tourist' explores audiences' perceptions of film and their covert relationship with tourist advertising campaigns, alongside the nature of newly-born tourist industries and the reaction of native populations and nation-states faced with the commodification of their histories, identities and environments.

Ana García Silberman, Professor at the Universidad Nacional de Mexico. She has conducted extensive research on planning, culture, urban mobilities, regional development and tourism in Mexico. A strand of the research deals with environmental change and globalization processes in the Yucatán Peninsula.

Mimi Sheller, Swarthmore University, USA. Her research interests include histories and futures of freedom and democracy in the Caribbean and wider Atlantic World, Colonial and Postcolonial studies related to the sociology of global relations as traced through the past and present movements and circulation of commodities, images, people, capital, and "nature". She is co-editor of the journal 'Mobilities' and has published extensively on mobilities and urban infrastruture, cars, tourism, and new spaces of high connectivity.

John Urry, Director of the Centre for Mobilities Research at Lancaster University. He has publised extensively on globalization, cultural industries, tourism, mobilities, complexities.

Call For Papers

We invite papers and presentations on such topics as:

Cultures and practices of elite consumption in the Caribbean and the Mediterranean from a historical perspective;
Manifestations of the 'luxury fever' among middle classes in mass resorts today and historically;
Changing perceptions of the 'mass' element in mass tourism in relation with elite consumption;
New de- and re-naturalizations of landscapes taking place around elite consumption;
Media representations of luxury tourism;
Effects of ostentation in cultures of hospitality and, more specifically, on the solidarities these conspicuous lifestyles are enabling or hindering among the 'ordinary' people;
Significance of the consumer spaces and practices of the super-rich in articulating global flows of people, objects, money and ideas;
Infrastructures enabling the transnational lifestyles of the super rich;
Methodological challenges of researching the residential and consumer spaces/practices of the super-rich.

Abstracts should include a title, contact details of the author(s) (name, postal address, email), and a summary of no more than 300 words. Please submit abstracts to the organisers no later than the 1st July 2008.

The Workshop will be held in the Institute for Advanced Studies Meeting Rooms 2/3 at Lancaster University on 11-12 September. The event will run from 12 noon on the 11th to 4pm on the 12th. There are a limited number of places so please book soon to avoid disappointment.

Registration

The regular registration fee is £50 and the unwaged registration fee is £25 to include all meeting costs, lunch and refreshmentson both days. There will be a dinner in Lancaster on the night of the 11th (not covered by the registration fees). Please let us know if you would like to attend the dinner. If required, a range of overnight accommodation is available at own cost on campus and in Lancaster. Please register here

Accommodation

Guestrooms at the University

Lancaster House Hotel (on campus)

Lancaster Tourist Accommodation

or contact Pennie Drinkall for any queries

We hope to see you in September.

Organisers: Javier Caletríoand Matilde Córdoba Azcárate

Co-sponsored by CeMoRe - Centre for Mobilities Research and the IAS - Institute for Advanced Studies

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