Fostering a culture of care for tourism graduate students in the academy

Abstract

This study reflects the imperative to cultivate space for care specifically for our graduate community against the backdrop of polycrisis. Drawing on a feminist ethic of care as our theoretical framework, we examine how universities may cultivate a caring space for graduate students. Guided by an arts-based methodology, we draw attention to the complexity of graduate students’ lives beyond academia and illustrate how art-based methodology may act as an apparatus for reflexive tourism engagement. Drawing on Creative Analytic Practice we offer a series of vignettes crafted by our graduate students leading up to and following a two-day symposium co-hosted by the Tourism Education Futures Initiative (TEFI) and Tourism RESET. Our findings reveal the effectiveness of practicing an ethic of care to challenge neo-liberal values and agendas in the academy by focusing on attentiveness (listening and including graduate students) and responsiveness (including engaging and co-designing responses) with our tourism graduate students. We conclude by exploring how we may recenter care by creating spaces for our students to share their engagement in a care-based symposium. We encourage challenging traditional ways of doing research and training scholars in the academy. There is an urgent need for a step-change in the academy that centers care by attending to the care gaps in our scholarly community.