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The experiential nature of visits to cultural and heritage attractions is theorised. Contemporary discourses posit the emergence of a thoughtful consumer and a paradoxical dumbing-down of culture. The discursive links between active consumption and thought/learning, and of passive consumption with dumbness/fun, are argued to be fallacious; the meanings of active and passive are in need of re-evaluation. Dumbing-down is suggested to be a discursive term for the lowering of the threshold of engagement by cultural producers, implying neither dumb content nor dumb consumers. Postmodernisation has eroded the protocols governing access to culture, producing two simultaneous effects: the augmentation of opportunities for thoughtful engagement, and increasing commodification giving rise to a smart consumer with an initial focus on transaction. A popular threshold of engagement is a recommended and rational strategy for attracting and engaging both thoughtful and smart consumer

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Changes can be identified in patterns of Western tourism over recent decades. The changes are linked with the theorized cultural shift from modern to postmodern. The discourse of change points to a shift in emphasis from the designated resort environment to a proliferation of individuated experiences. Analysts are apt to link these changes to a growth in individualism and individualistic expression. This study argues that the new tourists' real needs are to discover a new form of the collective. The argument is constructed drawing on the work of Veblen and Bourdieu. The final diagnosis draws on the work of Foucault.

Holidays have been imagined as occasions of escape and liminal leisure. This conceptualisation requires re-evaluation as a consequence of the widespread adoption of portable communication devices (smartphones) and the use of Web 2.0 interactive platforms (social media). Studies suggest that the gratifications of contact with the 'other', and the enjoyment of the license associated with the liminal condition, are compromised by endemic contact with the domicile. An analysis draws on the work of Heidegger and Althusser, and is supported by insights from Foucault, Arendt and Lacan. It is argued that users are 'enframed' and subjected by their devices. This re-imagining is representative of an evolving change in the human condition, of which the compromising of tourism-as-escape is but one manifestation.