A few weeks ago, two members of our staff team – Andy Suddaby and Emmanuel Adu-Ampong – attended the 2016 ATLAS (Association for Tourism and Leisure Education and Research) Annual Conference in Canterbury. This conference which also marked the 25th anniversary of ATLAS took place on 14th – 16th September, 2016. It was a very good conference at which we had some amazing conversations with old and new colleagues on topics ranging from ‘halal tourism’ to event legacies in Greenland. We also listened to a number of interesting presentations on current research on dark tourism, volunteer tourism, music festivals and domestic tourism.

We also had the opportunity to contribute to the discussions by presenting our own papers.

Andy’s paper was on the impact that workplace bullying and negative conflict has on vulnerable groups of workers employed in the hospitality service sector. The research findings demonstrated that when a serious conflict such as bullying reaches a destructive level, the culture of the hospitality workplace is frequently less supportive than it could be.

The paper presented by Emmanuel focused on how the location of key attractions within the community of Elmina, Ghana shapes the form of heritage tourism and the extent of benefits derived by the community.  The findings identify the ways in which the location of the Elmina Castle vis-à-vis the Elmina Township plays a significant role in shaping the form of heritage tourism experienced in the community.

One of the highlights of our participation at this conference was the guided walking tour through the key sites of ‘old’ Canterbury city centre. For a change we became ‘tourists’ and enjoyed listening to the history told by our tour guides. This experience offered us a new perspective that we will definitely bring to the classroom to share with our students.