Introduction
Sense of place has become pivotal in appreciating different phenomena in leisure tourism. Contemporary promoters of tourism in outdoor recreation underscore the opportunities to connect with nature, natural sceneries, or with the true value of a tourist destination (Roult, Adjizian, & Auger, 2016). Indeed, man has become highly mobile in private and professional dimensions (Hibbert et al., 2013). Roult et al. (2016) argue that this trend has led to the regular consumption, appropriation,n and usage of new places; thus, contributing to the review of some theoretical and conceptual approaches about the bond between people and places (Moser & Weiss, 2003). Studying places visited for the purposes of leisure has become a core element in emerging reflections because they seem to be more than just functional spaces for a specific practice (Elkington & Gammon, 2014; Hibbert et al., 2013). This essay discusses the relationship between leisure tourism and the sense of place.
Place Concepts
Various assumptions about the role of place in leisure or recreational visits have been proposed and debated. Over a decade ago, Kyle and Chick (2007) studied the social construction of a sense of place. Specifically, Kyle and Chick (2007) investigated the meanings recreationists associated with the environment in which their fair experience took place. Kyle and Chick (2007) found that participants’ sense of place derives from interactive processes, relating to the person, the physical setting,g and their social world. The sense of place derived from such interractions were found to be largely independent of the physical characteristics of the place.
Various terms have been used to define the term place (Kyle & Chick, 2007). Kyle and Chick (2007) attribute this heterogeneity partly to the origin of the various scholars, who embody differing ontological and epistemological perspectives. In addition, varied study contexts, such as built vs. natural environments, long-term residents vs. transients, have added to the plurality of different concepts related to leisure or recreational tourism. Despite such variance, these concepts have a lot in common.
“Place attachment” has been used to describe the interaction between people and place they visit. Low and Altman (1992) use the term to imply the bonding of people to a place, and stress the central role that affect, feelings, and emotions play in developing place attachment. Also, practice and cognition accompany these emotional elements (Low & Altman, 1992). Otherwise, Low and colleagues (1992) argue that analogous ideassubsumes the concept of place attachment or vice versa.
Jorgensen and Stedman (2001) attachment to a place is an independent component of the sense of place. These scholars used attitude theory to support a conceptualization of the sense of place that included affective, cognitive, and conative parts. Low and Altman (1992) described the affective relationship between landscape and tourists or visitors. The place dimension refers to place identity, while the conative dimension of the sense of place refers to place dependence.
Hay (1998) differentiated sense of place from the concept of place attachment by arguing that sense of place considers both the geographical and social aspects of place bonds and appreciation (sensing) of places. In this light, Hay (1998) argued that local ancestry and insider status were crucial in the creation of a deeply rooted sense of place. Rooted sense of place relates to the level of experience of a place, akin to the indigenous and long-term settlers of a place.
Various scholars have emphasized the subjectivity of the sense of place as a construct. Tuan (1977) differentiated place from space by arguing that once people get a better understanding of a space, it becomes a place. Similarly, Steele (1981) referred to the subjective perceptions of the environment by people in addition to their feelings about such environments. Hummon (1992) suggested the dual nature of the sense of place, comprising both an interpretive perspective on and an emotional reaction to the environment. However, Hummon (1992) argued that emotional components dominate the interpretive aspect of the concept, as perceptions of places are always described in a language of value and sentiments, among other personal meanings.
Meanings of Sense of Place
Various definitions of place have been developed. According to Smith (2015), a place can be viewed in recreational terms as a cocktail of destination qualities, such as architecture and landscape, heritage and history, as well as social structures and relationships. For other authors, however, linking tourism and place means interpreting place as a socio-ecological construction with the real and tangible artefacts intertwined with imagined and perceived cultural and individual artifacts (see Cohen et al., 2014; Hibbert et al., 2013; Gavari-Barbas, 2013).
Sense of place has different means depending on the context. About tourism, it implies the experience of tourists on leisure tourist sites and their relationship with the local communities (Smith, 2015; Cohen et al., 2014). Sense of place, in this light, comes at the centre of a more authentic promotion and marketing of tourist destinations. For this reason, focusing on place as opposed to space corresponds to bringing authentic local communities with their cultural legacies instead of cultural celebrities, as they are often out of line with the social reality of the local community (Smith, 2015). Therefore, according toSmithh, people who are the genuine owners of a culture stimulate the visitors and are the main object of their pleasure. On the other hand, these authors advocate for the promotion of leisure destinations as living environments that are appealing to visitors for their authentic social and natural landscape (Smith 2015; Cohen et al., 2014). In making this suggestion, Smith (2015) and Cohen et al. (2014) avoid questioning expert actions from areas associated with recreational tourism, such as territorial planning, marketing, and architecture.
Based on Cohen et al. (2014), recognizing social and structural forces of a tourism destination involves an insight into the behaviours of tourists and consumers of recreational resources on the site. A deep understanding of the behaviours of the visitors while on the leisure site can be achieved by deeply considering their values, needs, expectation and level of satisfaction, and above all, motivation.
Cohen et al. (2014) point out that multiple modelshaved been developed in recent years to identify the forms of motivation connected to different tourism practices. Hibbert et al. (2013) and Blackshaw (2010) argue that such motivations derive from tangible factors, including costs of touring, in addition to physical and structural attributes of the place, among others. Also, leisure tourists can be motivated by intangible, emotional factors that are critical in defining the tourism experience and whether the experience can be repeated in the future (Blackshaw, 2010, cited in Roult, Adjizian, & Auger, 2016).
Briddle et al. (2015) point out that multiple studies highlight the important role that individual choices and decisions play in tourism motivation, although the influence of relatives and friends cannot be undermined. Smith (2015) argues that analysing behaviours in tourism necessitatea s comprehensive approach to obtain precise and accurate information about levels of satisfaction, which corresponds to the sense of place. In light of these, some recent research reveals that connecting with local communities, their chief values, and obtaining an authentic display of the cultural landscape inspires leisure visitors to further bond and identify with thetourists destination (see, Karen & Washington, 2015; Cohen et al., 2014). In other words, they develop a sense of place they visit and would like to visit the destination again and experience the same feelings as they did the first time they visited the place.
According to Williams and Kaltenborn (1999), there is a popular attitude that the security linked with space-timecompressions inspirese a search fan or authentic and stable place. However, the moral or social value of maintaining a unitary sense of place is liable to criticism (Williams & Kaltenborn, 1999). On the one hand, some anti-modernist philosophies, such as communitarianism and bioregionalism, imply are revertion to a mode of spending time in place that has been popular in the past. According to Sagoff (1992), such philosophies imply that people can prevent a tourist destination from becoming lost in the space of the global market, which is abstract, by sinking their bonds more deeply into the site.
To others, for example Shurmer-Smithth and Hannam (1994), a sense of place is a romantic, dangerous sentiment to recreate Tonnies’ community (Gemeinschaft). Such critic believes that communitarian and bioregionalist politics hold the potential to be racist and indifferent to others. In this vein, Harvey (1996) argues that postulating such modes as the sole grounds for politics poses a great risk, as they become exclusionary and even neo-fascistic. From this perspective, to believe that these societies will esteem the positive enlightenment values of cultural diversity and justice ffor othersis naive.
According to Massey (1993), a progressive view of place is better as istriveses to give credibility to the human needs for authenticity and rootedness, appreciating that people should not construe such sentiments to be a case for exclusionary communities. The challenge concerns how to maintain the idea of spatial difference of uniqueness and rootedness if people prefer it, without making it appear reactionary. Therefore, long internalized history does not confer specificity to place; instead, the fact that it is constructed out of a specific combination of relations collectively articulated at a specific location dodoesPlaces comprise a limitless mix of local and global processes. Modernity, generally, facilitates the range of relations that constitute a place, but does not diminish the uniqueness of a place. In light of this, Williams and Kaltenborn (1999) argue that although a place can have a unique attribute, tourists and visitors can feel it without subscribing to the Heideggerian idea of exclusivity and essentialism. Notwithstanding, identities of places often lack the coherent, seamless, and singular attributes often linked to the notion of the sense of place; different identities of place can be constructed, which often can be a source of conflict and richness.
McClinchey (2016) showed that people’s perceptions of a sense of place of cultural entrepreneurs were linked with the themes of belonging and identity. These two themes can be acknowledged further via themes of attachment, duality of place, roots, home, and rootedness (McClinchey, 2016). In general, humans attack meanings to a place or develop a sense of belonging to that place, which gives it an important role in the construction of people’s identity (Hargreaves, 2004).
Conclusion
The “Sense of place” has been constructed differently by different scholars. Nevertheless, the concept has been described as a subjective attribute of tourists or visitors to a destination. Thus, it involves the emotional and cognitiveaspectst of a tourist. It also involves the authentic and unique culture and social attributes of the permanent residents of the place.
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