History of Tourism: What can the History of Technology contribute?

Session of the 44th ICOHTEC Symposium, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 23-29 July 2017

During the second half of the 20th century tourism became a typical leisure activity of members of consumer societies. Meanwhile tourism is one of the most important sectors of the economy and is of global occurrence. Indeed cities are growing especially for tourism. For example, the Spanish Costa del Sol developed from an economically poor region of agriculture and fishing in the 1950s to a mega city of 150 km length today. The city’s environment and the city’s infrastructure is designed especially for tourism. What about the technical requirements and the environmental impacts of such developments? In which way were experiences of travelling shaped by technology and by the built environment?

Papers could deal with:

-          The technical development of hotels or apartments for vacation

-          The infrastructure of tourist places

-          The development of transportation facilities

-          Old and new technology as tourist attraction

-          Comparison of relatively new special tourist cities and cities which became tourist places due to their history as the Austrian city of Salzburg

-          The environmental impact of tourism and its ongoing discussions

-          The experiences of touristic travelling and the role of technology

Please contact me, submit an abstract of 250 words, and a one-page CV to until 20 February 2016.

Stefan Poser, Helmut Schmidt University, Hamburg

For information about ICOHTEC’s symposium in Rio please visit http://www.icohtec.org/annual-meeting-2017.html