Ordinary tourism and extraordinary everyday life: Rethinking tourism and cities

Much tourism theory used to define tourism as the antithesis to ‘everydayness’. In this chapter, I unsettle and reverse this claim by arguing that the everyday is not necessarily ordinary and tourism not necessarily extraordinary. I discuss empirical trends, concepts and theories that allow us to understand and reassess the intertwinement of tourism practices and everyday practices, and how locals and tourists live closely together, in cities. In broader perspective, this chapter argues that tourism ought to play a much more prominent role in urban studies that have been remarkably blind to the ever-increasing economic, social and cultural role of global tourism in shaping the everyday spaces of cities around world. The chapter is divided into three vignettes. The first ‘de-exoticises’ tourism theory by discussing how everyday socialities, distant social relationships and hobbies inform tourism practices and fuel specific forms of tourism. In dialogue with Maitland’s work on new urban tourism, the second reflects on new urban tourism and practices that value non-touristic neighbourhoods, non-designed local experiences and private accommodation (such as Airbnb). In relation to this, the third vignette discusses how we can theorise the ‘touristification’ of neighbourhoods and encounters between tourists and locals