Tourism at the Olympic Games: Visiting the World

Going far beyond being just a mega sport event, the Olympic Games are, and have been in the past, important settings for tourism and cultural change. Hosting the Olympic Games presents a unique opportunity for countries to promote, regenerate, and develop cities and regions, and to firmly locate them within an increasingly competitive global tourism marketplace. From Athens to Rio de Janeiro, Olympic landmark buildings, ‘districts’, and ‘parks’ have permanently transformed cities and regions, and gained tremendous material and symbolic value as tourist attractions. On another level, the Olympic Games produce a kaleidoscopic range of intangible and quasi-religious engagements with place and spectacle. They have a tremendous impact on the image of the host country, while invoking collective memories and touching on emotions such as suspense, compassion, togetherness, and pride. Tourism has also become a major watchword in ongoing debates on the ‘legacy’ of the Olympic Games, and it deeply penetrates discourses on social justice and cultural change on a local, national and global scale. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change.

Mike Robinson is Professor of Cultural Heritage, and Director of the Ironbridge International Institute for Cultural Heritage, at the University of Birmingham, UK. His interests lie in the production and consumption of categories of heritage within changing cultural and cross-cultural contexts. He is particularly interested in how tourists experience the past, and how tourism works with heritage to shape identities at the individual and collective levels.

Josef Ploner is a Lecturer in International Education at the University of Hull, UK. He is a cultural anthropologist who specialises in cultural and heritage tourism, travel and tourism as forms of learning, narrative ordering, and the formation of personal and collective memory. Furthermore, his research also focuses on global student mobilities and cross-cultural experiences in international Higher Education settings.