Prof. Kevin Hannam speaks at the International Geographical Union meeting in Spain

Professor Kevin Hannam delivers keynote entitled Tourism Mobilities, Borders and Bodies at the Tourism Shaping Places, International Geographical Union Tourism Commission 

Professor Kevin Hannam, Middlesex University Dubai, was recently invited to give a keynote talk at the International Geographical Union (IGU) meeting at Vila-Seca, Catalonia, Spain.

The International Geographical Union (IGU) is an international, non-governmental, professional organization devoted to the development of the discipline of Geography. The purposes of the IGU are primarily to promote Geography through initiating and coordinating geographical research and teaching in all countries of the world.  Its work is conducted through the instruments of its National Committees, Commissions and Task Forces. The IGU hosts the International Geographical Congress every four years and also promotes regional conferences and other meetings that further of the objectives of the Union.  The IGU also facilitates the participation of geographers in the global community of scientists through its formal affiliation as a Member Union within both the International Council for Science (ICSU) and the International Social Science Council (ISSC).

This conference offered a global forum for attendees from academia, industry, government and other organizations to actively exchange, share, and challenge state of the art research and industrial case studies on the theme of tourism destination management.

Professor Kevin Hannam gave the opening keynote entitled Tourism Mobilities, Borders and Bodies. This presentation reflected on the conceptualisation of the end of ‘traditional’ understandings of tourism from the perspective of the mobilities paradigm. Kevin argued that geopolitical events have led to various re-bordering processes which in turn has led to a rethinking of event spaces involving multiple governance assemblages and the ‘stretching’ of time and space. He further demonstrated that tourism mobilities have a greater relevance to the study of the practical outcomes of contemporary geopolitics by drawing upon a range of case studies of the embodiment of borders. 

The keynote was well received, and complemented the other two eminent keynote speakers, Professor Mathis Stock (University of Lausanne, Switzerland) and Professor Szilvia Gyimothy, Aalborg University, Denmark).

Professor Kevin Hannam is the founding co-editor of the journals Mobilities and Applied Mobilities, and is the Campus Programme Coordinator for the recently launched MSc in International Tourism Management at Middlesex University Dubai.