Ateneo - UPO

THE GEOGRAPHY OF TOURISM: FROM THEORY TO PROJECT AND OUTLINES OF THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF TRAVEL

The teaching will be organized in two Teaching units:
1) ORGANIZATION AND EVALUATION OF TOURISM PROJECTS
2) ANTHROPOLOGY OF TRAVEL

ATTENDING STUDENTS:

Teaching unit “ORGANIZATION AND EVALUATION OF TOURISM PROJECTS” for attending students:
-notes and E-learning lessons and documents uploaded on "DIR" digital teaching platform.

Teaching unit “ANTHROPOLOGY OF TRAVEL” for attending students:
The study program consists of:
A) Attilio BRILLI, Gli ultimi viaggiatori nell'Italia del Novecento, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2018.
B) A text to be chosen among:
1. Eric J. LEED, La mente del viaggiatore. Dall’Odissea al turismo globale, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1992.
2. Franck MICHEL, Altrove, il settimo senso. Antropologia del viaggio, Milano, MC, 2001.
3. Sulle strade del viaggio. Nuovi orizzonti tra letteratura e antropologia, a cura di Luigi Marfè, Milano, Mimesis, 2012.
For attending students, a seminar on travel literature will be organized, on its role as ethnographic and anthropological source. Active and positive participation in the seminar will exempt students from studying a few chapters from textbooks indicated in points 1 and 2 for the purpose of the exam (the details will be announced in the “Avvisi” section on the DIR website. Slides projected during lectures will be available on the DIR website - www.dir.uniupo.it. Please note that slides are intended as a support for the lectures and do not replace studying the exam texts.

NON-ATTENDING STUDENTS:

Teaching unit “ORGANIZATION AND EVALUATION OF TOURISM PROJECTS” for non-attending students:
1) Stefania Mangano, Geografia del turismo. Nuovi turismi per nuovi mercati, Mondadori Università, Milano, 2026.
2) Dino Gavinelli, Giacomo Zanolin, Geografia del turismo contemporaneo. Pratiche, narrazioni, luoghi, Carocci, 2019.

Students enrolled in the 8-credit course are also required to study the following articles available in Open Access:
1) Afferni R., Ferrario C., Giordano F. (2025), Strategie di valorizzazione dei siti UNESCO: l’esperienza dei Sacri Monti del Piemonte, in S. Benetti, S. Cerutti, G. Pettenati (a cura di), Geografia e patrimonio, Società di Studi Geografici. Memorie geografiche NS 27, 2025, pp. 257-262 (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CqbJRf5HcM54_418eOo4cm3nLJxx5v2H/view)
2) Caravello E. (2024), Viaggi nell’immaginario: il turismo virtuale nel sito UNESCO di Tarragona, in De Spuches G., Mercatanti L. (a cura di), Viaggiare nell'immaginario. Immaginare il viaggio, Palermo University Press, Palermo, pp. 89-108 (https://www.researchgate.net/profile/EmanuelaCaravello/publication/369453923_Viaggi_nell'immaginario_il_turismo_virtuale_nel_sito_UNESCO_di_Tarragona/links/641c3c4192cfd54f8421629b/Viaggnellimmaginario-il-turismo-virtuale-nel-sito-UNESCO-di-Tarragona.pdf?_tp=eyJjb250ZXh0Ijp7ImZpcnN0UGFnZSI6InB1YmxpY2F0aW9uIiwicGFnZSI6InB1YmxpY2F0aW9uIn19)
3) Bagnaresi, D., Battilani, P., Gasparini, M.L., Mariotti, A. (2024). Addressing Over and Under Tourism Along Cultural Routes. Lessons Learned from the H2020 Project rurAllure. Cham : Springer (https://cris.unibo.it/retrieve/4c3bd8a1-c0ad-43f9-a8d7-9374013b4ce1/1368-9254-1-DR%282%29%20rev%20AM.pdf)

Teaching unit “ANTHROPOLOGY OF TRAVEL” for non-attending students:
The study program consists of:
A) Attilio BRILLI, Gli ultimi viaggiatori nell'Italia del Novecento, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2018.
B) A text to be chosen among:
1. Eric J. LEED, La mente del viaggiatore. Dall’Odissea al turismo globale, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1992.
2. Franck MICHEL, Altrove, il settimo senso. Antropologia del viaggio, Milano, MC, 2001.
3. Sulle strade del viaggio. Nuovi orizzonti tra letteratura e antropologia, a cura di Luigi Marfè, Milano, Mimesis, 2012.
C) Beyond the two aforementioned texts, non-attending students will be required to consult one text of their choice from a selection curated by the teacher and made accessible on the DIR website at the beginning of the course.

Through the two teaching units, “ORGANIZATION AND EVALUATION OF TOURISM PROJECTS” and “ANTHROPOLOGY OF TRAVEL,” the course aims, at a basic level, to enable students to achieve the following learning OBJECTIVES:
- KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING: to acquire basic and specialised knowledge of the main authors, concepts, and debates within the anthropology of travel, situated within the broader field of anthropological studies; and, within the field of geography, to recognise and understand the characteristics of the tourism system and tourism supply chain, as well as tourism products and destinations.
- ABILITY TO APPLY KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING: to develop ideas related to the practice of applied anthropology in the context of travel; to acquire familiarity with the basic methods of field research; and to understand the scope of research in the anthropology of travel. The course also aims to foster students’ independent judgement and critical thinking through seminar-based activities and discussion, both with the instructor and among participating students. Students will develop a critical perspective on tourism scenarios in order to identify their purposes and assess their impacts on different social contexts. In the field of geography, these learning outcomes will enable students to navigate the complex dynamics of tourism at different scales—global, supranational, national, regional, and local—and to formulate informed assessments of the main dynamics of the tourism market, as well as of the organisation and evaluation of tourism projects.
- COMMUNICATION SKILLS: to communicate, either orally or in written form, the topics addressed in the course using appropriate terminology in the fields of anthropology and tourism geography.
- ABILITY TO STUDY: to undertake, on the basis of the knowledge acquired in the two teaching units, further bibliographical research on the subject of travel. In particular, students will be expected to demonstrate the ability to identify and retrieve specialised sources relating to the anthropology of travel and the geography of tourism, as well as to make effective use of relevant technologies.

At a more advanced level, the course aims to foster the acquisition of: the ability to formulate critical judgements on the topics discussed, developing coherent lines of reasoning that also reflect independent and personal elaboration of the issues addressed (transferable skills); the ability to present the topics covered in the course in a fluent and precise manner, using the specialised terminology acquired throughout the course.

The achievement of the mentioned learning outcomes will be assessed as part of the final evaluation of learning.

The credits for classroom teaching are divided between lectures and interactive teaching in the following ratio: Lectures: 2 credit and Interactive teaching: 0.4 credit.
The course requires 9.6 credits for individual learning activity at home.

Basic knowledge of human and economic geography
No required antrophological background knowledge

Lectures (in class and itinerant lessons), slides, powerpoint presentations, materials and link on case studies and Lectures (in class lessons and itinerant in Vercelli region), slides, powerpoint presentations, materials and link on case studies and discussions in class and in the DIR platform. Moreover, for Anthropology of Travel: analysis of selected sources and oral presentations in class participative analysis of covered materials.

This course gives 6 credits in the GEOG-01/B (former M-GGR/02) sector. These credits are essential for access to teaching Geography in secondary school.
The slides used during the course, and other teaching materials will be provided on the DIR website. Students are required to register on the DIR website (www.dir.uniupo.it).
Students with physical disabilities, Learning Disabilities or Special Education Needs can request specific services and tools via the Staff Sviluppo e Coordinamento Carriere e Servizi alle Studentesse e agli Studenti, consulting the University webpage: https://uniupo.it/en/services/services-students-physical-or-learning-disabilities. Students with disabilities, learning disabilities or special education needs, once they have contacted the University Staff, can refer to the tutor in charge of the course to define the examination modalities, concerning academic aspects.

The final assessment for the integrated examination will take into account the grades obtained in the individual assessments for the two teaching units of which the course is composed (“ORGANIZATION AND EVALUATION OF TOURISM PROJECTS” and “ANTHROPOLOGY OF TRAVEL”), as well as the overall level of depth of knowledge acquired, the degree of autonomy demonstrated in applying such knowledge, and the student’s communication skills, in accordance with the stated educational objectives and expected learning outcomes.
The assessment criteria are as follows: - understanding of the course content; - relevance and effectiveness of responses in relation to the course content; - degree of structure and articulation of the response; - appropriateness of the disciplinary terminology used.
The examination grade is expressed on a scale of thirty. The examination is passed with a grade of at least 18/30.

For the teaching unit “ORGANIZATION AND EVALUATION OF TOURISM PROJECTS” the examination consists of a one-hour written test comprising six open-ended questions. For attending students, the examination will cover the topics addressed during the course and the supplementary materials provided. For non-attending students, the examination will cover the texts listed in the bibliography.

For the teaching unit “ANTHROPOLOGY OF TRAVEL” the examination, designed to assess the achievement of the stated educational objectives, consists of either an oral or a written test, upon student’s discretion. The oral test lasts approximately 25 minutes, while the written test lasts 60 minutes.

Lecture's contents of the teaching unit “ORGANIZATION AND EVALUATION OF TOURISM PROJECTS” will cover the following topics: Introducing the Tourism-Geography nexus; the historical development of tourism; residents and travellers in contemporary society, tourism typologies; defining and measuring the tourism industry: tourism and leisure; a matter of scale: global issues in local contexts; tourism destinations; stereotypes, images, imaginaries and representations; tourism policy in Italy: from framework legislation to regional autonomy; stakeholders and the “power” in tourism development; tourism projects and planning issues; the significant roles played in by some of the most renowned international designations, such as UNESCO World Heritage sites and Capitals of Culture; understanding the tourism impacts on societies and environments; green economy and green tourism: ecotourism and protected areas; from overtourism to no tourism.

In particular, the teaching unit “ANTHROPOLOGY OF TRAVEL” will address the following topics: Concept of culture. Travel and tourism. A specific travel experience: the pilgrimage. The ethnographic travel. The alpine excursion. Travel experience in Italian inner areas. Concepts of the Anthropology of Travel. Critical analysis of examples and ethnographic materials related to the travel.

Integration of the gender dimension:
Within the teaching units of the course, both in lectures and seminar meetings, space will be given to the study of the gender dimension, with examples and in-depth analysis related to womens's tourism and the experience of female travel.

KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING: knowledge of some fundamental theoretical concepts of anthropology of travel and geography of tourism; knowledge of the ethnographic and geographic research fields; ability to understand and contextualize the anthropological change of Italy during the 20th century starting from the analysis of some travel narratives and ability to understand the main characteristics of the tourism system, the tourism supply chain and the current tourism products and tourist destinations.
ABILITY TO APPLY KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING: ability to identify, to critically interpret and to place some aspects of ethno-anthropological culture and geography of tourism; ability to critically read a text.
EXPRESSION OF OPINIONS AND JUDGMENTS: ability to make personal pronouncements about the concepts covered; ability to compare ethnographic and geographic data.
COMMUNICATION SKILLS: ability to critically communicate the acquired knowledge by using appropriate terminology.
LEARNING/STUDYING SKILLS: ability to draw on bibliographic resources in order to acquire new skills; ability to combine theoretical and methodological concepts with the direct observation of ethnographic and geographic data.

In order to achieve an advanced level, students must prove as follows: An organic vision of the themes covered during the course, summary and analysis ability; Personal elaboration and review of the covered topics with excellent expressive command; Ability to independently deepen particular topics.

The forementioned results are consistent with the SUA of the Course of Study.