ABSTRACT

Despite the burgeoning research in dark tourism, there is still no universal acceptance of its definition. Past research is criticised for focusing on the motivation rather than the nature and consequences of the dark tourism experience, specifically their phenomenological and contextual basis. This study contributes to the field by adopting a reflective autoethnographic approach for providing a better understanding of dark tourism experiences. The study critically reflects on the researcher’s immersive experiences at three USA dark sites (Ground Zero, Gettysburg and Ellis Island). The findings reveal that emotional engagement (type and intensity of emotions elicited during the dark tourism experience) plays an important role in probing and helping visitors to generate meaning through their dark tourism experiences. The study expands the literature on dark tourism experiences by proposing an adapted dark tourism typology framework whereby emotional engagement is used as an explanatory theoretical concept to better identify and understand the nuanced types of dark tourism experiences. In addition, by adopting a multi-disciplinary and experienced-focused approach, the study also contributes to dark tourism research by providing a theoretical underpinning and practical evidence on the sources and processes helping visitors to generate meaning, which is deemed central to immersive dark experiences.

摘要

尽管对黑暗旅游的研究蓬勃发展，但其定义仍未得到普遍接受。过去的研究因关注动机而不是黑暗旅游体验的性质和后果，特别是它们的现象学和背景基础而受到批评。本研究通过采用反思性的自我民族志方法来更好地理解黑暗旅游体验，从而为该领域做出贡献。该研究批判性地反映了研究人员在美国三个黑暗地点（零地、葛底斯堡和埃利斯岛）的沉浸式体验。研究结果表明，情感参与（黑暗旅游体验期间引发的情绪类型和强度）在探索和帮助游客通过他们的黑暗旅游体验产生意义方面发挥着重要作用。该研究通过提出一个适应的黑暗旅游类型学框架扩展了关于黑暗旅游体验的文献，其中情感参与被用作解释性理论概念，以更好地识别和理解黑暗旅游体验的细微差别类型。此外，通过采用多学科和以经验为重点的方法，该研究还通过提供有关帮助游客产生意义的来源和过程的理论基础和实践证据，从而为黑暗旅游研究做出贡献，这被认为是沉浸式黑暗体验的核心.