DIT PhD/MPhil Project

Supervisor name & contact details: / Dr. Theresa Ryan
4027565


Research Centre Name and Website (if applicable) / School of Hospitality Management and Tourism
Funding Agency / If no funding is available, please leave blank
Scholarship Details / Please give details of student stipend and research fees covered by the funding
Subject Area / Tourism
Title of the Project / Heritage sites and contested memories
Project Description (max 300 words)
According to Cassia (1999) history as a scholarly activity is a means of producing knowledge about the past while heritage is a means of consuming that knowledge. Heritage sites are central to tourism activity not least because they constitute an important forum through which messages about national identity, values and beliefs can be promoted. Tourists seeking to learn about the places that they visit understand that heritage sites, whether buildings, monuments or places, offer an opportunity to access and consume heritage that has been deemed to be important. If history is what a historian regards as worth recording and heritage is what contemporary society chooses to inherit and to pass on (Tunbridge and Ashworth 2006: 6), then heritage sites are hugely important because they embody the selective representation of the past and officially make manifest the decisions that have been made about what is to be remembered.
This project is concerned with heritage interpretation and representation of sites in Ireland thathavea complex and unsettling past. It addresses a key area that is largely under researched in the literature by focusing on the extent to which tourist encounters lead to unexpected or unintentional experiences and to what result. In particular, it explores how Guiding narratives can produce unsettling and unanticipated effects on tourists, perhaps causing them to reflect on their own personal and collective memories, prompting them to adopt offensive or defensive positions, or reminding them of other kinds of memories. In heritage settings little is known about the nature of the relationship between the visiting tourists, the sites they visit and their resulting experiences at these sites, At a time when Ireland is entering a decade of momentous centenaries, the questions posed by this research are of profound importance.
Please indicate the student requirements for this project
A 2.1 or higher in a relevant degree (e.g. Tourism, History, Geography)
Deadline to submit applications (only for funded projects)
Please choose College as appropriate
College of Arts and Tourism