Abstract
Physical travel has traditionally been viewed as an agent of transformation. The research conducted on this topic, however, is surprisingly narrow in scope. Few studies have attempted to look beyond a particular tourism/travel segment or discipline and most utilise a restricted range of methods and analysis. These investigations have also failed to consider the long-term impacts of corporeal travel and how changes continue to evolve over time. Drawing upon a holistic and interdisciplinary study of transformative travel, this article argues that in a mobile world, it becomes increasingly difficult for individuals to distance themselves from elements that maintain a particular way of thinking and acting. While a traveller may physically remove their body from a specific geographic location, contemporary and historic flows of people, ideas, information, objects, memories and symbols create mobile spaces, places, landscapes and identities, where both familiarity and difference abound. Transformation through physical travel becomes a complex social phenomenon.
Introduction
In its most basic configuration, ‘transformation’ is defined as ‘a marked change in form, nature, or appearance’ (Oxford English Dictionary, 2010). The broadness of this definition has seen the term come to be used to describe all manner of changes and transitions, and, as such, its usage is somewhat difficult to map. With reference to physical travel, it has been used to refer to both the effect of travel upon a place (its people, representations economy, structures and cultures) and its influence upon travellers (Lean, 2009). The concern of this article is the latter.
As Leed (1991) observes, physical travel has a long association with personal transformation. He argues that throughout history, departure has offered individuals an opportunity to remove themselves ‘from a defining social and cultural matrix’ (Leed, 1991: 26). It is believed that physical relocation enables the alteration of a reality-confirming amalgam of roles, performances, relationships, expectations, objects, languages and symbols. Beyond this, Leed argues that corporeal movement is deeply embedded in the formation and continuing transformation of societies and cultures. As both Leed (1991) and Löfgren (2002) highlight, this is illustrated by historical links between words for travel, transition and experience, and the prevalence of journeying metaphors used to describe all manners of transition, along with life itself.
Travel remains heavily promoted as an agent of change. Among many other things, it is often claimed to promote learning (e.g. of languages, cultures, history, religions and places; see Immetman and Schneider, 1998; Roberson, 2003); cross-cultural understanding (see Litvin, 1998; Pizam, 1996); an awareness of various global issues (e.g. poverty, conflict, migration, trade and power imbalances; see Butcher and Smith, 2010; Palacios, 2010); environmental consciousness (see Beaumont, 2001; Ross and Wall, 1999) and wellness (see Kottler, 1997; Lean, 2009). It is also believed that these momentary insights can have long-term attitudinal and behavioural implications (Lean, 2009). These views, however, are also contested. Some argue that travel simply reinforces existing ways of seeing and acting in the world, supporting prejudices, misguided/‘false’ representations and, in the case of travel from developed to less-developed nations, the continuation of colonial relations (see Bruner, 1991, 2005). Research and anecdotes also suggest that the effects of travel are often only temporary, falling by the wayside as more pertinent concerns capturing one’s attention upon their return (Lean, 2009, 2012; Salazar, 2004).
While reviews have suggested that there is a lack of research in this area (see Salazar, 2004; Stronza, 2001), in actuality, there is a significant body of work that has investigated the influence of travel upon the traveller (see Lean, 2009, for an in-depth review). A more apt criticism is the limited insight this work provides. Studies have tended to use restricted methods to investigate specific effects, such as attitude change towards different cultures, impact on environmental consciousness and a wide variety of learning experiences, such as skills acquisition and language development. Research has also largely centred on the effects of particular forms of physical travel – for example, backpacking, studying abroad, nature-based recreation, pilgrimage and tourism – upon certain groups (e.g. nationalities, ages and genders) travelling to particular destinations (Lean, 2009). This work has primarily focused upon identifying the types of transformation that physical travel can deliver, along with classifying those elements that lead to lasting change. In doing so, it has neglected more pertinent questions surrounding the social phenomenon at play. It has also, generally, failed to recognise the relationship of physical travel, and the transformations that take place, with other mobilities experienced before, during and after travel. This includes acknowledging the continual alteration of individuals, societies and cultures through these forces.
These limitations align with a growing critique of travel and tourism research over the past decade. It has been argued that, through following positivist and reductionist agendas, travel research has tended to be overly preoccupied with particular groups/niches, motivations, destinations, origins, nationalities/nation states and attempting to build typologies, investigating increasingly narrower subdivisions and conceptualising travel as a binary – as bodily movement from a static ‘home’ environment to ‘away’, with eventual return home (e.g. Franklin, 2007; Franklin and Crang, 2001). Theorists such as Franklin and Crang (2001) and Robinson and Jamal (2009) have called for research that stretches beyond these boundaries. There have also been arguments posed for interdisciplinary approaches to tourism and travel research (see Coles et al., 2009; Robinson and Jamal, 2009). As argued earlier, a tight disciplinary focus has restricted the analysis and methods used in researching transformation through travel. As such, it is important that researchers draw upon the full palette of theories and methods available to investigate the multilayered phenomenon of travel and tourism (Haldrup, 2011; Robinson and Jamal, 2009).
Coles et al. (2009) argue that tourism and travel research should not only look for new ways of understanding but should also reframe what we are attempting to know. Previous studies on transformation through travel have been conducted through what Mavrič and Urry (2009) label an outdated paradigm of social research, where travel has been conceptualised as the movement of bodies between distinct and bounded societies in a formulaic manner. Within this paradigm, physical travel is seen as removed from one’s everyday existence and is framed as its antithesis (Mavrič and Urry, 2009). Travel and tourism become processes through which an individual can ‘escape’ regular roles and routines and view, and/or engage with, the ‘extraordinary’ (Franklin, 2004; Franklin and Crang, 2001). From this perspective, physical travel has been singled out for its potential to transform individual travellers with little regard for its inherent complexity or the influence of other mobilities before, during and after travel.
A mobile exploration of transformation through travel
It is increasingly argued that tourism and travel theory should be framed within the ‘mobilities paradigm’ (see Hannam, 2009; Mavrič and Urry, 2009). Rather than seeing social relations as operating within and between bounded communities, the mobilities paradigm sees humans as inhabiting a mobile world in which we not only travel physically but also virtually, communicatively and imaginatively (Urry, 2007). While the social sciences have traditionally focused upon fixed communities, and the face-to-face relations that take place within them, this has failed to account for scenarios in which interactions do not take place in physical proximity, along with the complex, and concomitant, interactions of these various flows (Urry, 2007).
Within the mobilities paradigm, transformation through travel can be observed as a more complex notion than is depicted in existing research. It becomes evident that the uncertain, and often contradictory, findings within previous studies arise from focusing upon small, isolated fragments of what is a highly complex global phenomenon. As such, an investigation of transformation through travel requires a holistic approach that captures a broad study population of diverse ages, nationalities, motivations and experiences before, during and after travel. A study of transformation through travel should not be limited to any particular niche of physical travel and must recognise its relationship to other mobilities. Coupled to this, research should not privilege any particular ideology or form of physical mobility. Where possible, research on transformation through travel should draw upon a selection of disciplinary approaches.
While previous research has generally focused on events taking place during physical travel, the mobilities paradigm places equal emphasis on those experiences occurring before and after any given experience. In addition, the paradigm allows for an acknowledgement of the many other ways one travels (e.g. communicatively, virtually and imaginatively) during corporeal travel. Finally, while similarities may be observed between different individuals, typologies must be avoided. Each traveller has unique experiences before, during and after travel, and there must be a focus on illustrating this complexity, as opposed to seeking an overly reductive and unobtainable positivist truth.
This has implications when it comes to developing definitional boundaries. Through the lens of the mobilities paradigm, and in the context of corporeal travel, transformative travel focuses upon physical mobility (in its many forms) and its consequential impact(s) upon, not only individuals but also social collectives, cultural groups, objects, ideas, places, spaces and landscapes. With these broad boundaries in mind, the study detailed in this article conducted an exploration of individual transformation through corporeal travel, allowing travellers to self-identify themselves as transformed travellers rather than imposing a predetermined, and restrictive, definition.
Methodological considerations
Researchers such as Mavrič and Urry (2009) and Haldrup (2011) believe that ‘classical’ ethnography needs to be coupled with ‘new’ techniques that establish a broader, more holistic view of mobile social practices. In addition to recognising the mobile nature of social relationships, there are increasing calls for approaches that better address the embodied, performative and sensory nature of social life (see Crang, 2002, 2003; Franklin and Crang, 2001).
The study detailed in this article sought to employ both classical and new methodological approaches. Primary research took two forms. The first approach utilised a website and email interviews to identify and converse with individuals who identified themselves as having transformed through travel. In the first stage of the project, conducted in 2005, the study was promoted through various travel forums, groups, message-boards and blogs, along with personal and industry mailing lists. In all, 61 individuals submitted forms on the website, and 34 participated in a series of three-email interviews asking questions based on various hypothesis within the travel and tourism literature (see Lean, 2009, for analysis of these preliminary findings). In 2007, 20 of these individuals agreed to be re-interviewed via email, and 17 new participants joined the study. Another follow-up email interview was conducted in 2009–2010, responding to the need for longitudinal research that tracks how changes evolve over time and become subject to ongoing mobilities (see Lean, forthcoming, for a detailed exploration of these methods). The follow-up interviews asked participants to reflect upon their previous submissions, whether their reported transformation(s) had altered in anyway, and whether they had undergone any further transformation(s), through physical travel or otherwise. A total of 78 individuals (born in at least – not all participants provided a place of birth – 15 different countries and residing in 18 countries) provided accounts of their transformation through travel from June 2005 to April 2010 (Table 1 shows the diversity of participants). These participants represented a broad spectrum of occupations and educational backgrounds. Interestingly, at least two-thirds were female. This does not necessarily mean that women are more susceptible to transformation. Gender may, however, influence role expectations and routines within various social and cultural groupings. While an analysis of gender was outside the scope of this study, it is a potential avenue for further enquiry.
Participants’ demographic details
The second approach to data collection was experiential, incorporating two research trips. In the first trip, lasting 9 weeks (January 2007–March 2007), I flew from Bangkok (Thailand) to Phnom Penh (Cambodia), backpacking through Cambodia and Laos before making my way back to Bangkok. During the second trip (December 2007–January 2008), I flew into Niamey (Niger) and travelled overland for 7 weeks into Benin, Togo, Burkina Faso, Mali, Côte d’Ivoire and Burkina Faso, finally flying from Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso) to Paris. In addition to fieldwork, I travelled to East Timor in 2005 for 3.5 weeks, along with a number of other side trips for conferences, master classes and leisure. Analysis of these experiences was conducted through the construction of a visual/narrative essay, comprising over 20,000 words and 200 images, depicting the experience.
I also became entwined in the lives of participants. I maintained contact with many individuals who I met while travelling, observing the continuing influence of their experiences and ongoing travel. Some online participants contacted me outside of the interviews (through outlets such as Facebook), and I consequently gained a view of their experiences well beyond the interviews. I also followed the travels of others outside the formal boundaries of the study. While these scenarios are impossible to plan and account for, it is important that these influences are acknowledged in terms of this project and drawn upon within travel research (while respecting ethical considerations). It is these experiences, combining personal performances, observation of and conversation with travellers, that form the knowledge base of this article.
Transformative travel through the lens of the mobilities paradigm
The study detailed in this article set out to conduct a holistic and interdisciplinary investigation of transformation through travel. In line with the arguments posed earlier, it did not seek to develop a specific definition of ‘transformative travel’ or to build a typology of a ‘transformative traveller’. It instead focused upon highlighting the general sociological processes at play. Through this approach, the study reached two central findings. First, the number of factors related to transformation through travel is arguably innumerable, making generalisation impossible and talking in terms of probabilities a necessity. Second, it was found that a traveller never completely leaves behind those elements that have formed their thinking and behaviours at the point of departure. Albeit to varying degrees, an individual experiences various processes of maintenance and transformation of reality during any physical travel, and for that matter ‘non-physical’ travel, experience.
The following section explores these two key findings. As it would be impossible to provide a comprehensive analysis of the infinite factors at play in the creation, maintenance and transformation of reality in a mobile context, along with the numerous crossovers, interrelationships and synergies between the various elements in any given physical travel and life experience, the remainder of the article instead aims to illustrate this complexity. This exploration is conducted under three key markers in the narration of transformation through travel: ‘before’, ‘during’ and ‘after’. The use of quotation marks in the titles is intended to acknowledge the problematic nature of these distinctions. As the article will illustrate, from a mobilities perspective, these categories are imperfect given that we are always travelling (whether that be physically, communicatively, virtually, imaginatively or otherwise) and that these experiences continue throughout our life’s journeys. Despite this, these labels offer a useful framework for exploring the notion of transformation through travel.
‘Before’
Anyone can be transformed by physical travel; transformation is a shift brought about by the alteration of those factors that make a particular way of being plausible and the introduction of elements that successfully establish the case for an alternative reality (Berger and Luckmann, 1967). As one might then expect, participants in this study identified a wide variety of prior-travel experiences that they believed were related to their transformation. This identification is part of a storying process in which participants establish a coherent, rational biography and depiction of their transformation through focusing on those factors with the most logical causal links (Berger and Luckmann, 1967). In reality, all occurrences prior to travel have some bearing (directly and/or indirectly) on the realities with which one enters a physical travel experience.
Social relationships
Some of the most commonly identified prior-travel influences included various forms of socialisation, including through family, friends and the respondent’s broader social surrounds. For example, many participants believed the values, attitudes, experiences and socio-economic positions of parents had a relationship with their thinking during the travel experience. In some cases, these formed the motivation/catalyst to travel to particular destinations. For others, it was not the thinking or teachings of parents but significant events in their parents’ lives, such as death or the onset of mental illness, that had influenced their motivations, experiences and meaning-making. For example, Evelyn (American, 50–64 years) wrote that the death of her mother at the age of 43 had encouraged her to travel and make the most of life: ‘She always enjoyed new experiences and died before she could really begin to enjoy life after raising two children’. In addition to significant others, participants detailed the effects of a broader chorus of others in constructing and maintaining reality through secondary socialisation. These included work and school colleagues along with various social collectives within the places from which the travellers were departing.
Roles, routines and performances
Participants also wrote about the influence of the various roles, routines and performances they engaged in prior to travel (as parents, children, spouses/partners, workers, sporting team members, citizens, genders, ages and races) and their associated expectations and sanctions for failure to comply. These played a critical role in establishing the thinking, behaviours and realities that travel presented the opportunity to transform. An influential prior-travel performance commonly raised was education. A number of participants believed that studying particular topics (e.g. history, geography, development and languages) had led to an interest in particular destinations and experiences, along with meaning-making. For many, travel had become an important part of their education, whether formally or informally.
Yet another pertinent role was the influence of work performances upon views, travel choices and consequential transformation(s). For example, Cai (born in Hong Kong and moved to Australia at the age of 12, 25–34 years) wrote that volunteering in Australia had influenced her perspective while backpacking through India, and Evelyn’s (American, 50–64 years) occupation as a registered nurse significantly influenced her observations regarding the inequality in access to health care while sailing the Caribbean. For some participants, the opportunity to travel was only enabled by a major change in roles and routines. For Charlotte (Australian, 50–64 years), it was the death of her husband: My travel plans were on hold while bringing up my family. As my husband suffered from severe motion sickness, it was really hard for us to go anywhere. My sister had taken a cruise several years earlier, and I told my late husband that one day I would do the same, to which he replied ‘yes you will one day’. The first cruise was, I suppose, a confirmation of that statement, and one where I could lose myself from the sadness and anguish that the death of a loved one brings.
Travel perceptions, knowledge and motivations
Individuals embark upon a physical travel experience with a perception of travel based upon their socialisation, personal experiences and the various social institutions to which they belong (Rojek and Urry, 1997). They also possess particular motivations for travel related to their unique reality (Prentice, 2004). The motivations reported by participants varied greatly: seeking a relaxing holiday, studying abroad, volunteering/working abroad, backpacking, military deployment, migration, dealing with the loss of loved ones and feeling the need to escape and change were just a few. Motivations grow out of roles, routines and thinking within the home environment that draw upon social constructions of place, fantasy, imagination, representations, family heritage (MacCannell, 1999; Prentice, 2004) and a long history of human mobility (Leed, 1991). They are born at a particular moment in time and continually change before, during and after the experience. Contrary to claims often made in the literature (see Lean, 2009), motivations do not determine whether one can, or cannot, transform through travel but represent one of many influences upon travel and transformation.
In addition to the above, there were a variety of other aspects occurring prior to travel that were evident within participants’ accounts and my own experiences. These included: the place that an individual inhabits and its particular social and cultural make-up (e.g. narratives, discourses, images, food, practices, media and objects), and the availability of all manner of things that may or may not vary from one’s travel destination; previous transformations that individuals may have undergone (and their consequential preparedness for change), along with ideas about change and transformation that they have been exposed to through socialisation; imagination (informing expectations, planning, desires and fantasy about both travel and transformation), stimulated by innumerable factors (many of which are captured in this list); ethnic roots and family history/heritage, which stimulate various kinds of knowledge, values, attitudes and behaviour towards, for example, places/destinations, physical travel and other mobilities, desires and imagination; representations of travel to certain places/destinations and in general (through television, movies, magazines, literature, the Internet, conversation and other travellers’ accounts, which may include stories of transformation through travel), including general representations of places/destinations through a wide variety of mediums; previous physical travel (that may or may not have led to transformation), which could potentially influence expectations and knowledge; historical and current mobilities, which influence people’s place of residence, their social institutions and their physical (e.g. motivations, destination/experience choices, travel companions, travel timing and meaning-making) and non-physical (e.g. virtual, communicative and imaginative) journeys (Urry, 2007); significant events and turning points (e.g. completing education, the death of loved ones, having children, terrorism and moving on to new ‘life-stages’), which cause individuals to reflect and modify or establish new meanings in their life; and a social stock of knowledge (to which we are exposed through socialisation; Berger and Luckmann, 1967) developed in concomitant relationship with a history of mobility, defining a diverse range of expectations, performances, narrations, interpretations and transformations (Edensor, 2009; Leed, 1991), which present travel both positively and negatively (as exotic, erotic, sensual, dangerous, adventurous, pleasurable and relaxing, to name but a few), each fed by various representations, imaginings, communications, technologies and objects.
As such, before embarking upon a physical travel experience, travellers come to be in possession of multiple realities through processes of socialisation that are unique for each individual (Berger and Luckmann, 1967). The realities, thinking and practices with which one enters a physical travel experience form the base upon which existing ideas and behaviours are further developed, or the marker from which these ideas are altered. The permutations and combinations of these experiences are arguably innumerable. Therefore, while impossible to predict, anyone may be transformed by travel. Transformation is dependent upon those experiences that unfold during travel itself; experiences that add many more layers of complexity to the notion of transformation through travel.
‘During’
While all travellers have unique journeys, there is also a common experience of corporeal travel; we travel as conscious, social and sensual entities, physically placing ourselves in ‘new’ geographical locations (albeit to varying degrees). By physically removing oneself from the geographical location in which subjective realities have been internalised, and continually reaffirmed, corporeal travel holds the potential to disrupt those elements that help maintain it. Relationships, conversations, social institutions, roles, routines, objects and symbols that have come to construct (and maintain) a particular way of looking and acting in the world (Berger and Luckmann, 1967) may all be modified through physical travel. Consequently, corporeal travel has the capability to expose travellers to alternative realities, along with providing opportunities and stimulus for reflection upon existing thinking and behaviours. In doing so, it may lead to the transformation of a traveller’s thinking and practices (Kottler, 1997).
There is a need, however, for caution in generalising the transformative possibilities of physical travel. While individuals remove themselves bodily from particular places, reality-maintaining elements continue to be available during their travels (albeit to varying degrees, depending on the individual and their travel experience).
Social relationships
As with experiences prior to travel, one commonly observed influence was social relationships and communication. One may travel with family, friends and/or compatriots who reinforce pre-travel realities. Although, even when travelling with significant others, or with those from similar backgrounds, the modification of roles, routines and exposure to new environments may stimulate different points of discussion than were had prior to travel. In addition, just because someone comes from a similar culture does not mean that they will not introduce new ideas. I often befriended people while travelling who I never would have encountered at home. They influenced the way I travelled and, in some cases, had enduring impacts after my return.
Travellers may become separated from regular conversations through forming relationships with new others (locals or travellers) or through having different conversations with existing others (as travel companions or through various communication systems). These conversations may range in degrees of intensity, intimacy and importance, from brief and trivial encounters, to spending days, weeks, months or even years in conversation/contact. Even when one travels alone it is increasingly common to encounter people with similar backgrounds. Travellers abound, whether travelling for pleasure, adventure, work, volunteering, study, research, asylum or to find a new life (Urry, 2007). A traveller is also often in contact with his or her ‘home’ via various communication systems (phones, Internet, email, blogs, social networking sites and post), which enable one to maintain social relations (albeit to varying degrees of distance and intimacy; see White and White, 2007). These technologies vary in how closely they replicate face-to-face interaction, from live Internet-based calls with a webcam to indirect forms such as email and blog posts. These systems may also allow travellers to continue former roles, which might be as simple as keeping in contact with friends and family, or more complex – such as continuing to complete work commitments and maintaining imagined presences. Befittingly, I asked my mother to accept my PhD scholarship on my behalf via mobile phone from Timor’s highest peak, Mt Ramelau (see Figure 1). It is even possible that the character, frequency and intimacy of contact via electronic means will not change during physical travel. In mobile societies, many relationships are sustained primarily through these methods and, therefore, the mechanisms through which these relationships take place may not alter with changing geographical locations (Cavanagh, 2007). Shifts in the traveller’s location, contexts, emotional state and/or reality, however, may change the nature of these communications (Jansson, 2006).
Calling home to tell my mother to accept my PhD offer, Mt Ramelau, East Timor.
Roles, routines and performances
While physical travel provides opportunities to alter roles and routines (Rojek, 1993), an automatic link to the transformation of reality cannot be made. New roles and routines will vary in degree of difference, for each traveller, and in different moments, to lives prior to any particular physical travel experience (Rojek, 1993). At the same time, old roles do not cease, even if continued only in memory and imagination. What is more, these ‘new’ travel roles, routines and performances often grow from an existing social stock of knowledge, and this may reinforce certain practices and ways of thinking (see Edensor, 2009; Light, 2009). Physical travel encompasses many performances, informed by a long history of human mobility (Leed, 1991). In this sense, the roles and routines that travellers engage in during travel often serve to reinforce an existing reality. However, no matter how structured and familiar an experience, the very nature of physical travel means that opportunities for reflection may still arise (Minca and Oakes, 2006) and could potentially lead a traveller to challenge existing thinking and behaviour.
Travel often allows one to engage in roles and routines not available and/or possible at ‘home’ (Kottler, 1997). The roles taken on by participants often varied greatly to ‘home’ lives, although this was rarely a complete separation. While one might leave roles behind, these will continue to some degree, if only in memory (Berger and Luckmann, 1967). As shown earlier, technology also allows for continued contact with significant others and work, and this continuation of roles, routines and performances might be an expectation within particular social institutions. Alternatively, the ability to maintain these roles may enable physical travel where it was not possible before, as technology compensates where face-to-face contact was previously required (Cavanagh, 2007).
Our roles also influence the way in which we travel and the meaning we make (Edensor, 1998). Associations with roles, routines and performances prior to travel remain and can become the catalyst for the interpretation of experiences, along with conversations with others. Tourism academics are prime examples of this, as reading, research and teaching converge with our performances of travel and tourism. Even when children remained at home, participants noted how being a parent influenced their thinking, pragmatic concerns, imagination, desires, memories and what resonated during the travel experience. Job and work commitments also remain on one’s mind.
Even with changing routines, many travellers re-enact performances available within a social stock of knowledge, and these performances influence the meaning that travellers draw from their experiences (Edensor, 2009). Bruner (2005) reflects upon how the travel experiences of those in his tour groups focused thinking and conversation upon the processes of the tour rather than local cultures and environments: ‘There was little exposure to the everyday life of African people. While the … tour may have expanded the envelope, tourism is always as much about the accommodations and forms of transportation as it is about the destination’ (p. 15). Beyond tours, Bruner argues that independent backpackers also have their own ‘restrictive’ patterns of travel. This is not to say that these forms of travel are not transformative (many participants said that they had experienced transformation after engaging in similar patterns of travel); it merely illustrates how some performances continue to reinforce an existing reality. Included within these performances are practices such as photography and the use of guidebooks, both of which may act to focus attention towards certain aspects of the experience.
Erin (Canadian, 35–49 years) wrote that the most significant factor in her transformation was the length of time she was away: ‘It took time and exposure, even in a limited way, with other cultures for the effects to occur’. While this perspective was common among participants and supports a general belief in the literature that longer journeys are required to bring about transformation (see Lean, 2009), participants also reported experiencing transformations during shorter experiences. For example, Daniel (American, 35–49 years) described the impact of numerous trips to national parks ‘ranging in time from a couple of hours to two days’. While longer journeys may increase the probability of change, trip length by itself is not a definitive factor.
Reflection
Experiences that stimulate reflection upon existing ideas and behaviours are considered to be an important part of transformation (Mezirow, 1981). Reflection could be sparked by anything that happens to resonate with an individual traveller, and is mediated by prior-travel experiences, whom one is travelling with and the particular mobile places, spaces and/or landscapes through which one is moving (see Crouch, 2010; Edensor, 2010). Despite claims made to the contrary within some literature on change through travel (see Lean, 2009), reflection can occur during even the most structured of physical travel experiences (and even when not necessarily desired), a phenomenon that Minca and Oakes (2006) label the ‘paradox of travel’. Minca and Oakes argue that while many may seek a sense of order through travel (e.g. comfort and relaxation in Western-style accommodation, restaurants and experiences), travel and tourism’s dependence upon binary oppositions and difference leaves the opportunity for reflection open. Even if reflection does not take place in a particular moment, memories of certain experiences might be stimulated in the future, both ‘during’ and ‘after’ travel.
Reflection is an important part of meaning-making and one that participants recognised as taking place both formally and informally. Formal methods included the following: discussions (with guides, travel companions, other travellers, locals and/or those at ‘home’), photography, note-taking, diaries/journals (online and paper) and blogs, emails and letters to friends and family. Of course, while this forms an important part of these individuals’ experiences, transformation can take place without formal reflection. Reflection draws upon prior-travel experiences and thinking in combination with innumerable influences, depending on the individual traveller’s unique experience (Minca and Oakes, 2006). Importantly, these formal methods may become key devices for remembering experiences and thoughts, and reinforcing any changes experienced, once the traveller has returned home.
Important ‘spaces’ for reflection, not adequately captured within the literature, are the ‘empty’ spaces of travel performances: the time spent in transit, waiting, relaxing or simply sitting and watching the world go by. Although these may not be the most memorable aspects of the journey, they often allow time for thinking, dreaming and imagination, formulating new meanings or ordering the chaos of more hectic parts of a journey. One’s thoughts may turn to his or her home, to previous, current and future travels or to anything really, limited only by one’s imagination and context. Figure 2 captures such a space on the 11-hour bus ride from Chiang Rai to Bangkok, Thailand. Having spent the previous 8 weeks in Cambodia and Laos, the shock of entering relatively developed Thailand and thoughts of returning home left me haunted. The people, experiences and emotions of the journey occupied my mind and left me not wanting to return.
Haunted – reflecting on the bus ride from Chiang Rai to Bangkok, Thailand.
Mobile places, spaces, landscapes and objects
When individuals engage in physical travel, they are moving between mobile places, comprising flows of people, objects, ideas, information and representations (Bærenholdt et al., 2004). Places are not only composed of contemporary flows but are also influenced by a long history of multifaceted and synergistic interactions, resulting in complex mobile landscapes and, albeit to varying degrees, depending on the place and the subjectivities of the individual or institution encountering and constructing them (Crang, 1998). All elements within place (both mobile and static), create symbolic representations, any of which could trigger memories, reflection, imagination, conversations and performances that may maintain and/or transform a particular reality during physical travel. This resonance takes place in concomitant relationship with prior-travel influences and a subjective reality that is continually evolving throughout the journey. Various flows of people, both historical and contemporary, have left an indelible mark upon the places through which we travel (Leed, 1991). What is more, places are in a constant state of flux (Bærenholdt et al., 2004), making it impossible to predict how these innumerable fluid characteristics may, or may not, resonate with each traveller and his or her unique experience.
Many places have a circulation of travellers: tourists, workers, volunteers, students, expatriates and migrants, to name but a few (Urry, 2007). Moreover, some of these flows will resonate strongly with the places from which one has travelled (Horne, 1992). Even when people believe that they are travelling to vastly different places, they often find themselves surrounded by familiar symbols (Urry and Larsen, 2011), for example, ‘Western’ brands and styles of clothing, food, languages and signs. Although these foreign symbols and practices (the result of globalisation) provide some familiarity, they may also have unknown consequences within different contexts. For example, rather than just a confirmation of a ‘Western identity’, some participants saw this as evidence that globalisation (and physical travel as an aspect of this) was resulting in ‘loss of culture’ and ‘declining authenticity’. This was expressed strongly by Christopher (American, 50–64 years), who reflected upon 30 years of travelling to South-East Asia: The main street of Yogyakarta used to be a chaotic festival of shops, markets and little restaurants. Now, one side of the street is taken up by a large air-conditioned shopping mall with McDonald’s, icy supermarkets and an Ibis Hotel. The young Indonesians seem completely obsessed by mobile phones, fake Italian fashions and overpriced Japanese trinkets. There is hardly a trace of Indonesian culture; except in the tourist shops.
For Christopher, these observations reinforced pre-existing attitudes about the influence of ‘American culture’ and ‘Western values’ on less-developed nations. Other travellers (and locals), however, would have completely different interpretations of this development, depending on their unique backgrounds and context. This sometimes led to consequential shifts of thinking and behaviour around aspects such as travel, consumption, political views, economic decisions and social relations, in a wide variety of ways.
Travellers also carry various objects and symbols with them: packs, clothing, equipment, books, music and languages (MacDonald, 2008). These objects may influence relationships and performances, along with stimulating memories of home, imagination and a traveller’s thoughts about who they are and who they should be (see Candlin and Guins, 2009; Lury, 1997). They may also influence one’s relationships (e.g. with locals, other travellers and authorities) through what they symbolise to different individuals and institutions (Candlin and Guins, 2009).
Even when visiting destinations perceived as vastly different from their own, travellers often frequent the same locations (especially through tourism), creating ‘enclaves’ around particular attractions that host the bulk of accommodation and traveller services, and in which travellers may find themselves in ‘familiar’ surrounds: familiar people, brands, symbols, clothing, practices, language, conversations and foods (see Bruner, 2005). These zones are often separate from the reality of local inhabitants outside of them, or at least offer complex hybridisations. Some participants believed that their transformation was only possible through making a conscious effort to move outside of these ‘bubbles’ and what they believed to be a familiar performance of ‘the tourist’. This was well illustrated when I asked Tegan (Canadian, 35–49 years) for her opinion about why she had transformed: I think [it is] the fact that I travelled on public trucks with people in Laos, not on tour buses with other westerners, and stayed in peoples’ homes or guesthouses, not in international hotels, and ate in their markets, not in hotel restaurants that made me see things a little bit more the way they actually are. Of course, I’m not saying that you see the daily life of the typical citizen this way because they are, after all, people who have been exposed to tourists before to some extent, but it does bring you some degree closer. If I had looked at everything through a bus window, I don’t think … I would have met some of the people I did. If my only interactions had been with hotel staff and tour guides, I would not have had the interesting and eye-opening conversations I had.
It can also be argued that there are ‘psychological bubbles’ that cannot be so easily escaped and that, no matter where one travels (though especially in less-developed countries), one’s presence will influence the ‘other’ (such as people, places, interactions, performances and representations; see Bruner, 2005). In addition, despite these perspectives, there were also instances where respondents reported transformative experiences occurring within these ‘bubbles’. For example, Charlotte’s (Australian, 50–64 years) transformative experiences had all occurred on cruises in the South Pacific.
Within global cities, one can find a diversity of people, along with the cultural representations that they generate and the practices in which they engage. Again, depending on the traveller’s unique perspective, these may resonate in many different ways and spark memories, imagination, desires and reflection. Their presence (or lack thereof) gives travellers some choice in the experiences they wish to pursue. Even when I was in Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso), there were a variety of flows, including a large selection of restaurants, including Chinese, French, Lebanese, Italian and other varieties of Western cuisine – although the interpretation of styles varied depending on who was doing the cooking (see Jackson, 2004). In addition to people and practices, there is an ever-increasing flow of goods, ideas, information, music and various availabilities of technology (computers, Internet, mobile phone infrastructure and television) across the globe (Urry, 2007).
It is also important to acknowledge that places are experienced through all of the senses and that sensual difference can influence one’s experience. In addition to vision, both differences and familiarities abound in sound (e.g. music, animals, machinery and processes), taste (e.g. foods, beverages, seawater and dirt/dust), smell (e.g. ‘the tropics’, woodsmoke, food, open drains, rubbish, the sea) and tactile experiences (e.g. the sensation of heat, cold, humidity, dust/dirt, sand, water, clothing worn or purchased while travelling, wearing a pack or feeling objects acquired, carried, created or encountered during a journey). For example, the Australia Post bike I rode in East Timor sparked memories of home, and hearing American hip hop in Timbuktu shattered the mystique of the historic settlement. With regard to transformation, these sensory experiences stimulate various meanings, memories, imaginings and desires, influencing thinking and behaviour, and ultimately the maintenance and transformation of reality.
Another aspect to consider is the temporal context of a visit. When travellers visit a place, they do so at a certain period in its flux. These moments depend upon a variety of factors and are unique to each journey. Some influences include varying flows of travellers (influenced by season, trends, economic conditions in different markets, tourist life cycle and safety concerns); migration; crime, conflict, instability, war and terrorism; political happenings; natural events and/or disasters; festivals and major events; seasons/climate (e.g. temperature, wet/dry and dust); religious and national holidays and variations in flows of objects, representations and the availability of technology.
While it is impossible to account for all factors that play a role in maintaining and transforming reality ‘during’ physical travel, from the condensed analysis above, one begins to see the innumerable elements that influence the experience and, as a consequence, transformation. While some commonalities may be drawn between certain travellers, the transformative experience is unique for each individual.
‘After’
The idea that one returns from corporeal travel is somewhat misleading. While travellers may physically return to their place of origin (though not always), the context to which they return, along with their perspective, will have altered to some degree, even if not perceivable. As seen in the preceding section, one may have formed new relationships, altered roles, routines and performances and/or carried, acquired or created objects that provide symbolic reminders of experiences, relationships, performances and places. In some cases, a returnee’s thinking, behaviour and reality may have altered significantly. At the very least, one returns with memories of one’s travel experiences (Braasch, 2008). Complicating this further, ‘home’ is not static and may alter during an individual’s time away (e.g. friends and family might change through their own physical, communicative, virtual and imaginative travels; people may adapt to an individual’s absence; infrastructure can be developed or altered; social practices and expectations could change and major events might take place).
Any alteration experienced during travel becomes subject to a number of influences upon one’s return (Lean, 2009). Individuals will most likely be re-immersed in relationships, conversations, roles, routines, sanctions, objects and symbols that contributed to the construction and maintenance of their thinking and behaviour prior to travel (Kottler, 1997; Lean, 2009). These interactions hold the potential to influence alterations in all manner of ways.
Social relationships
A common influence upon participants was the impact of re-establishing relationships and communication with friends, family and members of communities. For some, re-immersion into old social relationships acted to dilute new thinking and behaviours as participants experienced various sanctioning processes (see Berger and Luckmann, 1967, for an exploration of these processes). Some found their transformation was continued, and even enhanced, through the support of significant others and/or finding new others who could support their changed ideas and practices. This was the case for Tegan (Canadian, 35–49 years): ‘Some of my family and friends had experienced similar changes in outlook after travelling or changing jobs, so they understood where I was coming from’.
Most respondents also continued contact with locals and travellers met during travel, which stimulated memories and imagination of the journey and associated thinking and behaviour, even if only momentary. This socialisation is not limited by geographical proximity and can be enhanced by various technologies (e.g. social networking sites, online forums and message-boards).
Roles, routines and performances
Just as ‘before’ and ‘during’ travel, the various roles and routines that travellers engage in upon their return have a significant impact on the transformation experienced. Most participants found themselves re-engaged in old performances. In many cases, this acted to erode, or alter, thinking and practices experienced during travel that simply could not be maintained in the context of ‘home’ and the expectations (and sanctions) applied by various social groups. Others, however, found that taking part in old performances took on new meanings, given the transformation of thinking encountered during travel. For example, a number of participants reflected upon how they had come to view their own personal circumstances in a new light, which could be both positive and/or negative depending on the participant’s unique experiences. Many participants also reported having altered existing performances and/or establishing new routines so as to continue aspects of the travel experience (see Lean, 2012, for further analysis).
As with experiences prior to travel, education/study was often identified as continuing, or further altering, ideas and thinking. Moreover, these studies may, or may not, be informed by physical travel experiences. These performances also incorporate continuing travels, not only physical but also imaginative (about one’s travel experiences, the issues raised, the people met and fantasies/desires for future travel), virtual (facilitated by various technologies such as computers, mobile phones and televisions) and communicative.
Memories and mobile places, spaces and landscapes
The reflection upon, and stimulation of, memories about the travel experience, and/or issues encountered, were also observed to have an important influence upon transformation. This could occur at any time after one’s return, sparked by all manners of multi-sensory experiences. Reflection takes place both formally (e.g. post-travel ‘debriefings’ with travel groups and writing journals and travel reports) and informally: through continued contacts with travel companions and locals, various media representations (movies, documentaries, television programmes, news reports, magazines and sports), literature, photographs and objects carried, acquired and/or created during travel (Lean, 2012). A key reflective performance is sharing one’s travel experiences (e.g. with friends and family, on travel forums and message-boards), which can serve as a catalyst for reflection and a process through which new meanings are constructed in association with new others. In addition to this, just as with ‘before’ and ‘during’ travel, by virtue of inhabiting mobile spaces, places and landscapes comprising various historical and contemporary flows of people (e.g. colonisers, migrants, refugees, temporary workers and tourists), objects, information, images and representations and multi-sensory experiences, both direct and indirect reflective experiences can arise for returnees, even at the least expected moments (Lean, 2012).
While the above is by no means a comprehensive detailing of those factors that may act to maintain and/or alter thinking and behavioural changes encountered ‘during’ physical travel (a detailed analysis of how travel experiences continue ‘after’ travel can be found in Lean, 2012), it again serves to illustrate the innumerable complex and mobile influences upon any transformation experienced ‘during’ travel upon a participant’s ‘return’.
Conclusion
Transformation through travel is a complex social phenomenon. This article illustrates that, from a mobilities perspective, arguments about whether physical travel acts as an agent of transformation or simply reinforces existing ways of seeing the world, along with the quest to uncover a specific set of factors that lead to transformation, a typology of a transformed traveller and/or a definition of transformation through travel, are redundant; there are far more significant social processes to be analysed. As theorists such as Bauman (2000), Clifford (1997) and Urry (2000, 2007) illustrate, individuals, societies and cultures are continually travelling. In this mobile world, physical travel is deeply entwined with other forms of mobility (Urry, 2007). While various authors have argued against the division of physical travel into particular niches (see Franklin and Crang, 2001; Robinson and Jamal, 2009), a similar critique can be levelled at separating corporeal travel from other forms of mobility. As Urry (2007) argues, no particular mobility should be privileged, rather, one needs to observe an interconnected, mobile social system, a perspective that has led to calls for a focus upon mobilities rather than physical travel and tourism (see Hannam, 2009; Mavrič and Urry, 2009). Through this mobilities lens, transformative travel research becomes an investigation of the continual alteration of individuals, societies and cultures in a mobile world, a world in which ordered realties are formed and altered (albeit to varying degrees) in the face of constant flows (Bauman, 2000). There are, arguably, innumerable factors that may be related to an individual’s transformation/non-transformation through travel. Within a study of only 78 individuals, participants’ experiences were diverse and intricate, with physical journeys becoming entangled in continuing lived experience. Experiences, relationships and memories continue to influence ongoing journeys: future physical travels, work lives, raising children, coping with illness, falling in love and dealing with loss. It is a complex interplay of factors ‘before’, ‘during’ and ‘after’ travel that influences transformation.
In extrapolating travel beyond the purely corporeal, it is possible to argue that everyone is transformed by travel to some degree, whether perceived or not, or labelled as ‘transformation’ or by another title – change, shift or personal growth/development. Identities, relationships, realities and performances come to be constructed maintained and transformed through historical and contemporary travels, not simply as bodily movement but conceptualised as mobility in its totality, facilitated by corporeal, communicative, virtual and imaginative mobilities (Bauman, 2000; Urry, 2007). It is not physical mobility alone that acts as an agent of transformation. Transformation through physical travel becomes entwined in a much larger process – the socially mobile de/construction of reality.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
This study would not have been possible without the generous participants who shared their personal travel and life stories. I would also like to thank Russell Staiff and Robyn Bushell for their supervision and friendship throughout the project. In addition, both the Institute for Cultural Studies and the School of Social Science and Psychology at the University of Western Sydney were generous in their provision of resources and support.
Funding
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.
Garth L Lean is a postdoctoral fellow with the School of Social Sciences at the University of Western Sydney, Australia. He completed his PhD with the Centre for Cultural Research, University of Western Sydney, in 2011. His research interests focus on travel (especially the long-term influences of physical travel upon travellers), tourism, mobilities, cultural heritage, visual methods and alternative ways of presenting travel and travel research. He has previously worked in tourism at both the local and state government levels. Garth has published on transformation through travel, sustainable tourism, perpetual travel and travel/tourism/mobilities research methods. He is currently developing two interdisciplinary edited volumes: Travel and Imagination and Travel and Transformation.