پیشرفت در پژوهش توریسم ورزش؟متابررسی و کاووش برای آینده

This meta-review examines the journeys that previous reviewers of the field of sports tourism have take over the sports tourism research terrain. The contested nature of core concepts (terminology, categories and the nature of the phenomena), dominant research areas (event sports tourism, a trend from impacts to leveraging research, often poor quality behavioural research, destination marketing and media, and resident perceptions), and the extent to which research is underpinned by, or rooted in, various subjects and/or disciplines, are all discussed. Various futures envisaged by previous reviewers are identified; in particular: management futures, knowledge futures, futures of the nature of sports tourism, and critical and challenging futures. In conclusion, it is suggested that a clear indicator of the maturity of sports tourism as a field of study would be a ‘comfortableness’ with the existence of contested perspectives and ideas, and a reflexive appreciation of the strengths and weaknesses of research in the field, particularly in response to external challenges and critiques.

There is a temptation, perhaps even a tradition, when writing reviews of research progress in particular fields of study, to present an analysis or synthesis that is almost epiphanic in nature. The tradition is to discuss research to date and to arrive at a conclusion that research in the area has reached a turning point, or a stage of maturity, that (amazingly fortuitously) co-incides exactly with the time of writing of the review. And to propose that, thanks to the epiphany facilitated by the review, from this point or stage the future research needs or directions for the field are now clear. The reviewer's job is done, the review itself is justified, and the field can now make significant progress as its future direction has been clearly laid out. Such “epiphanic reviews” are assisted by the tendency to reify fields of knowledge, using expressions like “what the field needs” or “the field has attempted to define”. Committing the ‘pathetic fallacy’ of endowing a field with human emotions and with the capability of agency renders more acceptable the suggestion of the arrival of the field at an epiphanic point where it ‘realizes’ what it needs to do to successfully develop in the future. Of course, the problem here, other than the philosophical one, is that representing a reified field as having an epiphany from which the future is clear assumes (in fact requires) that there is a singular view of past, present and future research activity, and that the reviewer is simply collating and presenting such research in a way that allows the epiphany to take place. Such reviews also invite the collusion of others in a singular view by utilising a collective first person narrative suggesting, for example, that “we have witnessed the rapid recent development of our field”. In contrast to the epiphanic approach, this review of research relating to the relationship between sport and tourism presents neither an epiphany, nor invites collusion in the discussions. In fact, past, present and potential future research is presented as a contested terrain over which a range of previous reviewers have taken different routes from different origins to arrive at different points in the present, and from which they have seen different routes into the future. That the journeys presented by previous reviewers are so different is a function of, at various points in time: a lack of coherence in research relating to sports tourism; a lack of agreement about fundamental concepts and assumptions about the nature of the relationship between sport and tourism; the range of perspectives of (or taken by) reviewers; the aims and objectives of the reviews; and the nature of the processes of reviewing and/or synthesising research itself. To avoid this paper becoming simply another story of another journey through research, it will attempt a slightly different task, namely a ‘meta-review’. A meta-review is, quite simply, a review of reviews (c.f., Heal, 2008, Ruddy and House, 2005 and Serenko and Bontis, 2004). In this case it will involve an examination of the journeys previous reviews have taken through research in the field, and an interrogation of the explicit and implicit decisions made by reviewers in conducting the reviews. In this way it can explore the way in which, for example, conscious or unconscious decisions about what research and perspectives have been covered by the review have affected the journey the reviewer has taken across the research terrain. As most reviews make some comment on potential future research, this paper will also explore the research futures suggested. In taking such an approach, the aim is to present an historiographic and contemporaneous analysis of “progress in sports tourism”.

Weed's (2008a) commentaries in his Reader discuss the extent to which sports tourism might be reaching a stage of maturity as an academic field. He identifies various ‘markers’ of such maturity including, inter alia: a strong conceptualisation of the field; the underpinning of empirical work by appropriate theory; the robust, appropriate and transparent application of methods and methodology; and a clear community of scholars with a sustained interest in the area, served by and supporting a credible academic journal (the Journal of Sport & Tourism) and wider body of knowledge. While each of these markers has now developed in the study of sports tourism, the discussions in this meta-review and exploration of futures suggest that there may be two further developing indicators of the maturity of the study of sports tourism. The first is that a unified view of sports tourism may be unattainable. Researchers in a mature field of study will recognise that even foundational ideas are contested. As a greater volume of work in sports tourism develops, it is inevitable that competing perspectives will emerge. However, as McFee (2007) notes, researchers in a mature field of social science will recognise that the existence of contested ideas is a healthy state of affairs, because it brings a range of alternative perspectives to bear on the issues researchers in the field face, none of which will be dominant or hegemonic. The second further indicator of maturity is that researchers in the field can be reflexive, self-critical and responsive to external challenges. To a certain extent, the development of maturity in this area is related to a recognition of the need for multiple perspectives outlined above. A field in which researchers do not recognise and respond to external critiques and challenges will fall into the paradigm-trap of becoming ‘self-referential’ ( Bailey, 2006) and, eventually, irrelevant in wider debates on major social science issues such as global warming and economic development. Despite aspiring to avoid an ‘epiphanic’ conclusion, this meta-review and exploration of futures suggest that the journey(s) towards a mature field of sports tourism research are likely to involve a ‘comfortableness’ among researchers with the existence of contested perspectives and ideas, and a reflexive appreciation of the strengths and weaknesses of research in the field, particularly in response to external challenges and critiques.