Understanding the place-making practices of backpackers

Abstract

The place-making practices of tourists have long captured the attention of tourism researchers. This article examines how the everyday practices of backpackers contribute to place-making in the enclave and the hostel – two places common to backpacker destinations. Using participant observation supplemented by interviews, the research revealed these places to be characterised by a range of extraordinary and mundane backpacker practices and mobility rhythms. Places inhabited by backpackers were in constant flux and ‘co-created’ via practices in conjunction with an array of other phenomena. As backpackers interacted with one another, other people and the various materials, temporalities and environments that were present, they inadvertently contributed to place-making processes. The research shows how mobile people make place and extends understandings of how backpacker lives are lived. It demonstrates the centrality of practices to both place and mobility, highlighting the importance of tourist actions – rather than industry directives – to place-making in tourism.