Details
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1478-1495 |
| Number of pages | 18 |
| Journal | GLOBALIZATIONS |
| Volume | 21 |
| Issue number | 8 |
| Early online date | 16 Jul 2024 |
| Publication status | Published - 2024 |
Abstract
Global tourism competition has entered home and family space. Drawing upon ethnographic research in Guatemala, this paper investigates the postcolonial gendered politics that shape (and are shaped by) global tourism competition, homestays, and mothering labour. It shows how Guatemalan women turn to hosting as an economic strategy and, in doing so, become part of a complex power relationship between Spanish schools and their (primarily Western) language tourists (or ‘students’). Spanish schools only work with ‘host-mums’ deemed capable of meeting their students’ needs, desires, and expectations of homestays as affordable, enjoyable, pedagogical experiences of ‘real’ family. To achieve this, Guatemalan women become cosmopolitan, competitive subjects who devise and enact strategies to commodify, transform, and perform their mothering labour and homes/families in ways that appeal to their Western students. Far beyond creating desirable touristic experiences, the everyday competitive mothering of tourists is having widespread consequences at the personal, local, and global levels.
Keywords
- global competition, Guatemala, homestays, mothering, Postcolonial, tourism
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Social Sciences(all)
- Geography, Planning and Development
- Social Sciences(all)
- Sociology and Political Science
- Social Sciences(all)
- Public Administration
- Economics, Econometrics and Finance(all)
- Environmental Science(all)
- Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law
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In: GLOBALIZATIONS, Vol. 21, No. 8, 2024, p. 1478-1495.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Research › peer review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - The everyday competitive mothering of tourists
T2 - global tourism competition, homestays, and mothering labour
AU - Becklake, Sarah
N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2024
Y1 - 2024
N2 - Global tourism competition has entered home and family space. Drawing upon ethnographic research in Guatemala, this paper investigates the postcolonial gendered politics that shape (and are shaped by) global tourism competition, homestays, and mothering labour. It shows how Guatemalan women turn to hosting as an economic strategy and, in doing so, become part of a complex power relationship between Spanish schools and their (primarily Western) language tourists (or ‘students’). Spanish schools only work with ‘host-mums’ deemed capable of meeting their students’ needs, desires, and expectations of homestays as affordable, enjoyable, pedagogical experiences of ‘real’ family. To achieve this, Guatemalan women become cosmopolitan, competitive subjects who devise and enact strategies to commodify, transform, and perform their mothering labour and homes/families in ways that appeal to their Western students. Far beyond creating desirable touristic experiences, the everyday competitive mothering of tourists is having widespread consequences at the personal, local, and global levels.
AB - Global tourism competition has entered home and family space. Drawing upon ethnographic research in Guatemala, this paper investigates the postcolonial gendered politics that shape (and are shaped by) global tourism competition, homestays, and mothering labour. It shows how Guatemalan women turn to hosting as an economic strategy and, in doing so, become part of a complex power relationship between Spanish schools and their (primarily Western) language tourists (or ‘students’). Spanish schools only work with ‘host-mums’ deemed capable of meeting their students’ needs, desires, and expectations of homestays as affordable, enjoyable, pedagogical experiences of ‘real’ family. To achieve this, Guatemalan women become cosmopolitan, competitive subjects who devise and enact strategies to commodify, transform, and perform their mothering labour and homes/families in ways that appeal to their Western students. Far beyond creating desirable touristic experiences, the everyday competitive mothering of tourists is having widespread consequences at the personal, local, and global levels.
KW - global competition
KW - Guatemala
KW - homestays
KW - mothering
KW - Postcolonial
KW - tourism
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85198630039&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/14747731.2024.2373093
DO - 10.1080/14747731.2024.2373093
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85198630039
VL - 21
SP - 1478
EP - 1495
JO - GLOBALIZATIONS
JF - GLOBALIZATIONS
SN - 1474-7731
IS - 8
ER -