Tourists as Story-Builders

Narrative Construction at a Heritage Museum

Bibliographic Data

ID23338666
AuthorsAthinodoros Chronis (0000-0001-9514-9067, corresponding author)
Year2012
Volume29
Issue5
Pages444-459
Publication date2012-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Travel & Tourism Marketing (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1054-8408 • E-ISSN: 1540-7306
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/10548408.2012.691395
OpenAlexW2041017120
LanguageEN
Citations received61
References cited66

Although tourism scholarship supports the idea that the appreciation of a tourism experience depends on the availability and communication of stories, attention has been paid almost exclusively on marketers and tourism organizers as the main designers and promoters of narratives, ignoring the role of tourists themselves in this process. Using heritage museums as an empirical context, this research suggests that the success of a narrative presentation in tourism destinations also depends on the tourists' involvement, willingness, and ability to actively participate in the storytelling experience. In this sense, tourists act as story-builders whose main task is to construct a historical narrative based on the selection and integration of the available sources. The findings show that museum visitors go through a three-stage process during their effort to complete a heritage narrative and make sense of their tourism experience. This work sheds light on the coconstruction of tourism experiences and provides marketing direction for the successful narrative staging of museums and tourism places in general.

Heritage tourism · Culinary Culture and Tourism · Diverse Aspects of Tourism Research · Museums and Cultural Heritage

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub