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Negative Image? Developing The Visual In Tourism Research, William Feighery

William Feighery

Today, knowledge about the world is increasingly articulated visually and the ocularcentric nature of tourism is widely recognised by tourism 'professionals' and academics, as well as by tourists and 'locals'. This article examines the role of visual evidence in tourism research and takes as its starting point the convolution of 'looking', 'seeing' and 'knowing' in western culture. It then considers the 'status' of image-based research in the social sciences with particular reference to tourism studies. It is suggested that the recent interest in the so-called 'pictorial turn' heralds new opportunities for tourism researchers to embrace emerging visual methodologies and in …