‘Wish YOU Weren’t Here!’: Interpersonal Conflicts and the Touristic Experiences of Norwegian and British Women Travelling with Friends

Abstract

Tourism is often portrayed by the tourism industry, tourists themselves and tourism scholars as a liminoid site of escape, happiness and freedom from constraint. For many, however, holidays do not live up to this expectation. This paper challenges the dominant tourism discourse of holidays as sites of unproblematic pleasure in examining contestation, conflicts and negotiations between women and their travelling companions. Drawing on conceptualizations of in-group interpersonal conflicts and theorization of the mobile social identities of women travellers, we explore the impact of holiday conflicts on women’s holiday experiences and friendships. The findings of this qualitative study of female tourists from Norway and the UK suggest that women adopt various strategies to deal with open and hidden conflicts that may threaten their friendships and holiday experiences. Such strategies include avoidance of conflict through compromise, negotiation of appropriate holiday behaviours prior to travel, or ultimately choosing to travel solo.

Family tourism: Interpersonal interaction, existential authenticity and quality of tourist experience

“…Refering to the non-stranger travel companions’ interaction, the researchers paid more attention on the interpersonal conflicts, which may occur at various stages of travel planning, decision-making, and travel experience among couples, friends, relatives, spouses, or other intimate travel companions (Chesworth, 2003; Connell and Meyer, 2004; Decrop, 2005; Heimtun, 2011; Heimtun and Jordan, 2011; Huang and Liu, 2016). It is responsible that family members can be seen as a close unit for travel experience, the interaction between family members is likely to be more frequent than the average tourist interaction.…”

Chinese girlfriend getaway tourism in Buddhist destinations: Towards the construction of a gendered spirituality dimension

“…Joining other women also protects female travelers from feeling conspicuous, excluded, and isolated in couple-and family-oriented holiday spaces (Heimtun, 2010;Heimtun & Jordan, 2011).…”

“…Regarding the geographic distribution of all-female travel, current research is mainly focused on the United States and Canada (Berdychevsky, Gibson, & Bell, 2013;Berdychevsky, Poria, & Uriely, 2013;Gibson et al, 2012); in Europe, specifically in the United Kingdom and Norway (Heimtun, 2012;Heimtun & Jordan, 2011);in Southeast Asia, in Malaysia (Khoo-Lattimore & Prayag, 2015); and in Oceania, in Australia (Junek et al, 2006). Chinese female tourists have not been taken into full consideration in this context, yet they are active participants already given their high spending power (Li, Wen, & Leung, 2011).…”

Understanding the influence of interpersonal relationships on identity and tourism travel

“…It is not just the physical co-presence that creates the unity for June, but it is also the conversations that follow, which underpin the physical presence. Being in a different place is important, and Heimtun and Jordan (2011) suggest the holiday is "a special site of leisure that transports people (literally and emotionally) away from their everyday environments" (p. 272). June's description of the unity and connectedness with her family whilst on holiday presents a powerful reason for continuing to travel.…”