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Conceptualizing The Creative Tourist Class: Technology, Mobility And Tourism Experiences, Ulrike Gretzel, Jamal Tazim

Ulrike Gretzel

Increasing mobilities and an ever greater amount of technologies that support creativity have led to the emergence of a so-called Creative Class in our postmodern society. Creative Class members have distinctive experiences that blur the boundaries between everyday and touristic life. These experiences challenge conventional typologies of the tourist experience and have tremendous implications for tourism research and practice. In this article we discuss first what the Creative Class is, what experiences it has, and how it uses emerging technologies to create, mediate, and reconstruct these experiences. A special emphasis is placed on the relationship the Creative Class has with …