Hosts and Guests

The terms host and guest, of Latin (hostis) and Germanic (gast) origin, have been in use well before the development of modern tourism, which they have since accompanied. First edited in 1977 by Valene Smith, Hosts and Guests was also the title of a groundbreaking publication that marked the beginnings of the anthropology of tourism. Since then, scholars of travel and tourism have debated these terms, showing their usefulness as well as their limits when referring to the encounters between tourists and people living in the visited destinations, including the consequences and effects of these interactions. The notions of hosts and guests and their application to contemporary tourism have also been criticized for their tendency to disguise the commercialism of tourism relations and for neglecting ...