The insiders' gaze: fieldworks, social media and visual methodologies in urban tourism

Abstract

This paper aims at scrutinizing the role of two overlapping dimensions in tourism geography teaching and learning: the real-world perspective, represented by the fieldwork as a long-established practice in geographical teaching; and the digital sphere, namely the use of visual methodologies and social media as tools to activate city image-making in tourist practices. In particular, the work deepens critical aspects and potentialities of a mixed-method approach combining both traditional methods and more innovative tools to carry out researches and teaching in the field of tourism geography and cultural heritage. Theoretically inserted at the interplay among tourism, digital geography and visual methods, it draws on a series of workshops organized with third-level students between 2016 and 2018. Although problematizing some crucial conceptual issues related to the role of visualities and new technologies, findings highlight the didactic effectiveness of mixed methods that entail the more traditional ones such as team working and fieldworks, and the most innovative such as visual methods and social media, to increase students' interest in geography learning and stimulating their own perceptions of ordinary landscapes through a gaze repositioning.