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Spatial Changes Of Pilgrimage Centers In Pilgrimage Studies – Review And Contribution To Future Research, Justyna Liro, Izabela Sołjan, Elżbieta Bilska-Wodecka

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Pilgrimages and pilgrimage centres are a subject of research often undertaken from the perspective of geographic sciences. Geographical research on pilgrimage movement and sanctuaries is important due to its focus on the spatial aspect. This article analyses the current state of research on pilgrimage centres. The main trends of the current studies include: the phenomenon of pilgrimage in terms of religion, society, culture and tourism; as well as its impact, including on the development of the settlement and; studies of pilgrimage centres, in particular their impact on space in various spatial and temporal scales, as well as; the conclusions drawn …

When Brother Becomes Other: Communitas And Conflict Along The Camino De Santiago, Megan E. Havard

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

It is widely believed, both by scholars and practitioners of pilgrimage, that during the rite most if not all pilgrims experience communitas - a sense of community, of mutual understanding and acceptance of their fellow ritual initiates that is unfettered by traditional social structures or markers of difference. Nevertheless, evidence indicates that conflict also regularly arises among pilgrims, even as they navigate the same liminoid space in pursuit of a common goal. Pilgrims may experience conflict with one another due to differences in personality, divergent cultural backgrounds, the perception of scarcity of resources, the intrinsic stress of transformation, or myriad …

Interpreting Contemporary Pilgrimage As Spiritual Journey Or Aesthetic Tourism Along The Appalachian Trail, Kip Redick

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Pilgrimage and tourism can be interpreted as overlapping travel experiences. Given all the changes mass transportation and communication technologies have brought, understanding the phenomenon of pilgrimage becomes fraught with ambiguity. Is pilgrimage better understood as a tourist excursion that affords instances of religious devotion? Pilgrimage routes and long distance scenic trails have their aesthetic appeal, which pilgrims and tourists enjoy. Is there a difference in the way these two groups walk these trails that become manifest through aesthetic experiences and encounters? Looking at long distance hiking on the Appalachian Trail as spiritual journey opens up a reinterpretation of both pilgrimage …

Women's Words About Pilgrims To Santiago De Compostela, 1890 - 1920, Maryjane Dunn

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Many scholarly articles claim that the pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela was moribund at the turn of the last century based on statistical surveys of the Cathedral and Hospital Real registers, but these numbers only represent a fraction of the persons who devoutly visited Santiago Cathedral. In reality, the late nineteenth and early twentieth century pilgrimage as described by five turn-of-the-nineteenth-century female authors.- Emilia Pardo Bazán, Katherine Lee Bates, Georgiana Goddard King, Annette Meakin, and Catherine Gasquoine Hartley - is itself in a liminal state, between the traditional pilgrims to Santiago de Compostela and the newer tourist-pilgrim. The writings by …

Enacting The Glastonbury Pilgrimage Through Communitas And Aural/Visual Culture, Kathryn R. Barush

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The sacred sites of Glastonbury in Somerset, England have long been places of pilgrimage, connected to the legend of the journey of Joseph of Arimathea to the British Isles, and have fired the imagination from the Middle Ages to today - inspiring the Arthurian legends, folk-stories and song, and visual representations. In response to the question ‘What is Pilgrimage,’ this essay seeks to explore the conjunction of artistic representations and geographic journeys to and among the ancient topography and mysterious structures of Glastonbury, with a particular focus on how sacred travel, and especially an experience of communitas, can be engendered …

Concerning The Spectacular Austerities, Brian Bouldrey

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Modern pilgrims are the updated versions of hermit athletae Dei, athletes of God, as the Desert Fathers are called by Dorotheus the Theban. Are the more ascetic of religious pilgrims going too far with their spectacular austerities?

Western Travellers In The Land Of The Buddha Legitimising Travel Through The Religionification Of Tourism, François Thibeault

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

On the one hand, tourism has developed to such a point that it now shapes other social realities in global society. On the other hand, pilgrimage phenomena are thriving in the twenty-first century, as they become both more globalised and more particularised. This paper shows that drawing oppositions between pilgrimage and tourism assumes an exclusive, dichotomous view that is misleading. Instead, I insist on an understanding of the reciprocal influence between religion and tourism in which neither of the two spheres subjects itself to the other. The argument is based on the understandings and discourses of legitimation that Westerners travelling …

Pilgrimage-Tourism: Common Themes In Different Religions, Noga Collins-Kreiner

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The paper discusses common themes in different religions regarding pilgrimage-tourism and has four main goals. First, it shows that the boundaries between pilgrimage and tourism have become blurred. Second, it characterises the different changes that have taken place in pilgrimage research in recent years. Third, it re-examines three different pilgrimage case-studies in an effort to draw conclusions pertaining to the ‘pilgrimagetourism nexus’; and fourth, it highlights discrepancies between the ‘old’ paradigm, predicated on the assumption that religious elements lie at the core of pilgrimage, and the results of more recent research on secular models of travel, highlighting alternative and complementary …

The Economic Impact Of Pilgrimage: An Economic Impact Analysis Of Pilgrimage Expenditures In Galicia, Elisabeth J.E Graave, Jeroen Klijs, Wim Heijman

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

In this article, we calculate the economic impact of pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in the NUTS 2 region Galicia (Spain) in 2010. This economic impact is relevant to policymakers and other stakeholders dealing with religious tourism in Galicia. The analysis is based on the Input-Output model. Location Quotient formulas are used to derive the regional Input-Output table from the national Input-Output table of Spain. Both the Simple Location Quotient formula and Flegg’s Location Quotient formula are applied. Furthermore, a sensitivity analysis is carried out. We found that pilgrimage expenditures in 2010 created between €59.750 million and €99.575 million in …

Creating And Storing A Toolkit For Pilgrimage And Religious Tourism Sites, Peter Wiltshier

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

This paper reflects our abiding interest in our origins and of those religious and pilgrimage spaces that we attest to actively being part of our cultural inheritance. It explores options for, and barriers to, the creation of a repository of information to support practitioners and the clergy to maintain and develop these religious and pilgrimage sites. A model toolkit for storing collected knowledge is presented with illustrative examples from a range of sources. The examples used are largely drawn from a Northern / Western perspective.

The Possibility Of Pilgrimage In A Scientific World, Stephen F. Haller

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The paper is a philosophical argument about whether a pilgrimage can be meaningful in a scientific age. Since a scientific world-view rules out many ideas which are traditionally associated with pilgrimage, such as miracles and the effectiveness of prayer, it seems that pilgrimage might be a practice inconsistent with the modern scientific age. Attempts have been made to reconcile this conflict by arguing that science and religion do not conflict, but are non-overlapping spheres of inquiry. Thus, it is possible to make sense of pilgrimage in a scientific age, if one strips their pilgrimage of all aspects to which science …

The Importance Of Religious Tourism And Pilgrimage: Reflecting On Definitions, Motives And Data, Kevin Griffin, Razaq Raj

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

This discussion paper explores the topic of religious tourism and pilgrimage, examining it from a tourism industry perspective, reflecting on definitions, motivations and scale of the ‘product’ as reported at a global level. Mindful of the fact that international records of religious tourism are scant to say the least, this is an attempt to bring together definitions, classifications and data which come from a variety of sources. The paper draws together understandings from different religious traditions, presenting data and motivations on a variety of pilgrimage types. As the paper demonstrates, this ‘niche’ product is indeed enormous, and if industry projections …

Time Warp: Cinematic Pilgrimage To Lourdes And Santiago, Alison T. Smith

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Pilgrims experience time in ways that deviate from the norm. The pilgrim’s encounter with time can be disorienting due to environmental changes, physical hardships, and unexpected occurrences. Pilgrims may also feel an intense connection with the historical or personal past. This chapter will examine two films in which pilgrims experience dramatic shifts in the perception of time. Julian Schnabel’s The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is a cinematic interpretation of Jean-Dominique Bauby’s memoires by the same name. Bauby, the editor of Elle magazine, suffers a sudden stroke at the height of his career. Subsequent to the stroke, he experiences a …

Pilgrimage In Leadership, Jane Cruz

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Humans are universally drawn to the act of pilgrimage and current research informs us that the call to pilgrimage is increasing globally. In many cases pilgrimage is associated with religious ritual or a healing process. However, when pilgrimage is understood as archetypal behaviour, it becomes clear that an inner or outer pilgrimage can serve as a powerful metaphor for the development of transformational leaders. Exploring the works of important writers and researchers in pilgrimage, mythology, religion, history, psychology, philosophy, art and leadership development, this paper will demonstrate how the act of pilgrimage is a foundational symbol for leadership development. When …

Journeying Home: Toward A Feminist Perspective On Pilgrimage, Lesley D. Harman

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The archetypal feminine has earthy, creative, visceral, emotional and spiritual connotations suggestive of women’s quest for home. I wish to explore the meaning of home within the landscapes of the sacred geography of the soul, invoking the sacredness of place, the meaning of place, and the emotion of place. Findings from a seven-year autoethnographical study of women journeying home to islands in the Thousand Islands, a border region located on the St. Lawrence River between Ontario Canada and upstate New York, demonstrate that these themes figure deeply in the life decisions made by the women studied. ‘The River’ is experienced …

Ritual Identity, Suzanne Van Der Beek

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Rituals are often used as opportunities for self-reflection and identity construction. The Camino to Santiago de Compostela, which has become a singularly popular pilgrimage since the late 1980s, is an example of a ritual that is explicitly used to gain a deeper understanding of one’s identity through distancing oneself from daily life and creating a space of contemplation. Implicit in this function of rituals in general, and the pilgrimage to Santiago in particular, is the assumption that one is more authentic and closer to one’s true identity during the pilgrimage than one is in daily life. The ritual self, as …

Historical Perspectives Of Shifting Motives For Faith-Based Travel, Dane Munro

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Throughout pre-history and history, millions of people of many religions and faiths have undertaken pilgrimages. Although ‘the quintessential form of religiously motivated travel is pilgrimage’, the meaning of the practice of pilgrimage has changed over the centuries (Dietz, 2005:27). There are also some consistent Leitmotifs and principles in religious travel. Participants of the New Religious Movements (NRM) travel to Neolithic and other prehistoric sites (such as Malta) for a spiritual experience at such sites, seeking to fulfil needs which the historic churches cannot or no longer can fulfil. (Rountree, 2002:475-496). Many NRMs are based on historical values, past religions or …

When Is A Journey Sacred? Exploring Twelve Properties Of The Sacred, Jasmine Goodnow, Kelly S. Bloom

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

One of the first definitive works on the concept of the sacred was Emile Durkheim’s 1912 work The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. In it, he defined the sacred in opposition to the profane. The next major work on the sacred was not until Mircea Eliade’s The Sacred and the Profane, in 1959. A review of the literature since that time reveals that the thinking on the sacred/profane dichotomy has changed little since these seminal writings. A useful tool for examining the sacred was created in 1989 when Belk, Wallendorf and Sherry explored the dichotomy as it relates to …

Grit Or Grace: Packing For The Camino De Santiago, Megan Havard

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

As the director of a new collegiate study-abroad program that will invite students to complete a segment of a Christian pilgrimage across northern Spain, the Camino de Santiago (Way of St. James), I am tasked with setting the expectations of students, parents and administrators, and with addressing the needs of student travellers. The present chapter analyses several genres of cultural artefacts that novice pilgrims, such as my students, are likely to encounter prior to departure: travel guidebooks and manuals, publications more generally about sacred journeys, pilgrimage memoirs and films. These texts help to frame the journey ahead as a pilgrimage, …

The Camino De Santiago De Compostela (Spain) And The Via Francigena (Italy): A Comparison Between Two Important Historic Pilgrimage Routes In Europe, Guido Lucarno

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The Italian section of the Via Francigena, a Medieval pilgrimage route to Rome, has not yet been commercialised to its full potential when compared to the Camino de Santiago in Spain. There are many reasons for this under development. First, there is an absence of a specialised organisation focused on utilising the resources available; a difficulty that could be overcome by the forming a tourism body with the specific charter for developing these resources and attracting tourism. Second, the weight of the cultural heritage of Rome in the contest for religious tourism takes away from the valorisation of other pilgrimage …

Management Practices For The Development Of Religious Tourism Sacred Sites: Managing Expectations Through Sacred And Secular Aims In Site Development; Report, Store And Access, Peter Wiltshier, Maureen Griffiths

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Through a distillation of practices reflective of the extant literature and socio-economic approaches to inclusive development of sites of religious experiences and worship, we posit that there are seven core conceptual approaches to support evolving site management needs. Therefore, developing sites of special significance necessarily requires the dissemination and sharing of both intellectual and practical contributions to meet those needs in a planned and stakeholder-driven approach. Traditional approaches to development emerged half a century ago with a focus on core competencies and the agreed understanding that open and fair competition would raise quality and assure reasonable profit margins. Creating awareness …

Xuanzang And Bodhidharma: Pilgrimage And Peace-Building In Buddhist China And India, Ian S. Mcintosh

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

In the study of pilgrimage and peace-building, case studies deemed to be influential in initiating positive change in the world are in the spotlight. A novel example in which people with different ethnicities, cultures and walks of life have come together with a common purpose is associated with the spread of Buddhism from India to China beginning in the early centuries of the Common Era. Unlike other instances of the expansion of a world religion beyond its homeland, the spread of Buddhism along the maritime and overland ‘silk roads’ was not linked to domination or conquest. Rather, it was linked …

Begumpura Yatras: Constructing The Ravidassia Pilgrimage Tradition, Anna Bochkovskaya

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The long-term conflict in the Sikh community involving lower castes - predominantly, Ravidassias, chamar (cobblers/tanners) followers of the medieval saint Ravidas - and Jats boiled into an open confrontation after the Vienna incident (May 2009), when one of the Ravidassia leaders was killed by radical Sikhs in a local gurdwara. In 2010, Ravidassias launched their own religion - the Ravidassia Dharam, set up their own scripture - the Amritbani Satguru Ravidas Maharaj, and proclaimed the ultimate place of pilgrimage for the community - the Varanasi-based Ravidas Janamsthan Mandir that bears the name of Begumpura (a city without sorrow), a term …

Travelling Through Caste, Raj Kumar

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

With its peculiar caste system, India is considered the most stratified of all known societies in human history. This system is ‘peculiar’ as it divides human beings into higher and lower castes and this division is backed by certain religious sanctions based on the sociological concepts of ‘purity’ and ‘pollution’. While the higher caste is associated with ‘purity’, the lower caste is associated with ‘pollution’. The people of the lower castes are not allowed to undertake religious journeys and yet are expected to enable the pilgrimages of the higher castes by playing the role of laborers. Radical Bhakti saint-poets like …

The Politics Of Pilgrimage Through The Prism Of Mass Media, Alokparna Das

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Pilgrimage involves the movement of people either as individuals or as groups in search of what can be described as the sacred. Since pilgrimage is an integral part of Indian culture and has significant participation, pilgrimage sites and centres are being used by political and corporate organisations to communicate specific messages. The political relevance of religion in our contemporary world cannot be disputed, particularly in the context of a growing consumerist culture and the divisive tactics of most political organisations. In such a scenario, pilgrimage traditions and centres are periodically taken over by political groups. As a particular pilgrimage tradition …

Political And Merchant Devotees : Multiple Facets Of Pilgrimage To The Medieval Region Of Braj (16th And 17th Centuries), Swati Goel

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Braj is the epicentre of the Krishna cult. The physical representation of the scriptural Braj Mandala as we see it today, however, is a medieval construct. During the 15th and 16th centuries, as a part of religious exercises or in the quest for the land of Krishna, the propagators of various sampradayas (sects) reached the region seeking spiritual solace. This process of rediscovering Braj and the settlement of the various sects was followed by a thronging of the region by merchant-followers and, subsequently, by Rajput rulers from the adjoining kingdoms of Rajasthan and Bundelkhand. The pilgrimage to Braj created an …

Pilgrimage To The Abode Of A Folk Deity, Rajshree Dhali

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Pilgrimage to the shrines of folk deities differ little from pilgrimages to the centres of the institutionalised Gods. However, the historical evolution of a folk cult and the specific socio-cultural context of the emergence and growth of folk deities provides a different dimension to their religious space. This paper examines pilgrimage to the shrine of the folk deity, Goga that attracts followers from across faiths including Hindus and Muslims. The aim of the paper is to explore the double edged religious process at Gogamedi. First, the growing efforts by Hindu Brahmanical traditions to subdue and unsettle divergent traditions of the …

Pilgrimage, Politics And Surveillance: The Temple Of Jagannath And The Colonial State In Early 19th Century Orissa, Ujaan Ghosh

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The temple of Jagannath became central to colonial politics as early as the first year of British rule in Puri. Throughout the 19th century, the temple was an essential concern for British administrators, both in the colony as well as in the metropolis. In this paper, I demonstrate how pilgrimage became a pivotal anchor surrounding which a convoluted narrative of colonial politics played out. I have looked closely at the concept of ‘itinerancy’ associated with pilgrimage, and have tried to explain how itinerancy in the early 19th century became a governmental hazard for the colonial overlords. The constant fear of …

Glossary Of Terms Vol. 4(Vi)

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

No abstract provided.

Religious Tourism In The Hill Of Tepexpan: A New Research Approach - From Dedifferentiation, Víctor Mora-Torres, Rocío Serrano-Barquín, Héctor Favila-Cisneros, Carolina Serrano-Barquín

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

This theoretical and methodological paper presents research undertaken to comprehend the social dynamic of religious tourism in a traditional sanctuary located in the Hill of Tepexpan, Mexico. Visitor experience, as tourist or pilgrim, has been little studied in Mexican religious tourism literature, which has focused mainly on quantitative and economics aspects. For this reason, a more holistic and comprehensive way to understand the phenomenon is desirable, especially in destinations that receive a variety of visitors with different practices and motivations.

The Tepexpan Hill Sanctuary has been a sacred place since Colonial times for two ethnic groups: Mazahuas and Otomíes. Their …