Call for papers Special Edition on Dark Tourism for The International Journal of Cities

IJTC is planning a special edition highlighting current research in Dark Tourism, and in
particular its applicability to understanding its management in relation to cities as
destinations. For more information on IJTC please visit
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/loi/ijtc
Despite the recent growth of research into dark tourism (Dale & Robinson, 2011; Stone, 2013;
Tarlow, 2005) and the growth of the dark tourism market (Biran & Hyde, 2013; Stone 2006; Stone &
Sharpley, 2008), there has been little interest shown in understanding the relationship between dark
tourism and urban tourism (Powell & Kennell 2015). The huge competition between cities, coupled
with the growth in accessible transportation and the emergence of new economies into the global
economy, has meant that cities that have not historically been well-known tourism destination are
entering the tourism industry, leading to increased global completion between cities for urban
tourists (Ben Dalia et al 2013). Because of this, it is important for cities to understand areas of the
tourism market in which they can offer novel and unique experiences to tourists, to increase their
attractiveness The growing Dark Tourism market (Biran & Hyde, 2013; Stone 2006; Stone &
Sharpley, 2008) offers a way for many cities to become more competitive in this sense.

The attraction of death, disaster and the macabre promises to be a significant factor in the tourism
sector worldwide, and in Europe in particular. Dark tourism, or thanotourism as it is sometimes
called, offers the interested participant the chance to "gaze upon real or recreated death" (Stone,
2005: 3.) The fascination with scenes of tragedy is not unique to any one set or group of tourists, but
dark tourism, as yet, remains on the fringes of respectability: a number of authors have given
consideration to "shades" of dark tourism (Lennon and Foley, 2000; Stone, 2006; Strange and
Kempa, 2003) which is to say that it is recognised that there is a continuum of "dark" touristic
experiences, ranging from very mild excitation to the grim reality of the holocaust and terrorism, for
example.
There are a wide range of dark tourism products available to urban tourists in Europe, but these are
rarely conceptualised as such. The mixture of light and dark dark tourism products presents
difficulties in categorisation and standardisation of the urban tourism offer, but this is a potential
area of new product development for DMOs across Europe.

This special edition will be co-edited by Professor John Lennon (Glasgow Caledonian University,
UK) and Raymond Powell (University of Greenwich, UK.)

Professor John Lennon is Director of the Moffat Centre for Travel and Tourism Business
Development - the UKs largest University based tourism consultancy and research centre.

Professor Lennon is a Specialist Policy Advisor to the National Tourism Organisation;

VisitScotland and a Non-Executive Director of Historic Scotland. He is the author of five
books and over 80 articles and numerous reports on the travel and tourism industry
(https://www.gcu.ac.uk/gsbs/staff/professorjohnlennon/)
A seminal text in any study of Dark Tourism is Lennon, J., & Foley, M. (2000). Dark Tourism: the
attraction of death and disaster, Thomson, London.

Submissions are invited by 25th March 2017. Please submit to:

R.Powell@Greenwich.ac.uk
Papers should be a maximum of 8000 words. All submissions will be subject to blind peer review.
Publication for accepted papers is planned for December 2017.

Please address all queries and questions regarding suitability of potential papers to Raymond
Powell at R.Powell@Greenwich.ac.uk

References
Ben-Dalia, S. Collins-Kreiner, N., Churchman, A. (2013) ' Evaluation of an Urban Tourism Destination'
in Tourism Geographies Vol. 15, Iss. 2: 223-249

Biran, A. & Hyde, K. F. (2013) "New perspectives on dark tourism", International Journal of Culture,
Tourism and Hospitality Research, Vol. 7 Iss: 3, pp.191 198

Dale, C., & Robinson, N. (2011), Dark Tourism, in Robinson, P., Heitmann, S., & Dieke, P. (Eds).
Research Themes for Tourism, 38(1), pp 193-209.

Lennon, J., & Foley, M. (2000). Dark Tourism: the attraction of death and disaster, Thomson, London.

Powell, R. & Kennell, J. (2015) Dark Tourism and Cities in Europe an overview of the field
Cultural Tourism in a Digital Era
Second International Conference IACuDiT,
Athens, 2015, Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics, Springer

Stone, P. (2006). A Dark Tourism spectrum: towards a typology of death and macabre related
tourist sites, attractions and exhibitions, Tourism ,54(2), pp. 145-160

Stone, P., (2013). Dark tourism scholarship: A critical review. International Journal of Culture,
Tourism and Hospitality Research, 7(3), pp.307-318.

Stone, P.R. and Sharpley, R. (2008), Consuming dark tourism: A thanatological perspective, Annals
of Tourism Research, Vol 35, no.2, pp. 574-595.

Strange, C., & Kempa, M. (2003). Shades of Dark Tourism: Alcatraz and Robben Island Annals of
Tourism Research, 30(2) pp.386-405.

Tarlow, P. (2005). Dark tourism: The appealing darkside of tourism and more. Niche tourism:
Contemporary issues, trends and cases, 47-57.