西方国家旅游地理学进展

国内旅游地理学研究比西方国家晚了整整60年,全面了解国外旅游地理学的发展,对于国内相关研究具有很大的借鉴意义。本文在全面回顾西方国家旅游地理学发展历程的基础上,阐述了其研究方法和主要研究内容。最后对西方国家旅游地理学研究进行了总结:西方国家旅游地理学已经初步确立了自己的学科地位,开始朝着成熟阶段发展;西方国家旅游地理学研究是随着现代旅游现象的出现而出现,随着现代旅游的发展而发展;西方国家旅游地理学者脱离地理系的事实,严重影响了旅游地理学在地理学学科内的发展,这种趋势一定要引起国内学界人士的警惕。

REVIEW ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF TOURISM GEOGRAPHY IN THE WEST

The research on geography of tourism in the West can be traced back to 1920s, while it started in China in 1980s. So reviewing and understanding the whole development of the research on geography of tourism in the West are helpful to domestic tourism geography researches. Up to now, 80 years research experience on geography of tourism in the West can be divided into two phases: origination phase(1920s-1960s) and development phase(1970s to now). In this period, as the research achievement on tourism geography, a lot of academic writings and monographs have been published in academic periodicals or by publishing houses. Based on the review on the whole development course of tourism geography in the West, the paper elaborates the research methods, research contents and current research trends in geography of tourism. On the part of research methods, tourism geography research methods root in geography research methods, and at the same time, it absorbs the methods of tourism research. The research content mostly includes: conception, tourism attraction, tourist space bahavior, tourism effect, tourism space distribution and tourist destination development. At last, we sum up the experiences in the research on geography of tourism in the West, as follows:(1)The geography of tourism in the west has elementarily established its subject status and now develops towards mature phases. But because of insufficient theoretic contribution, there is a long way to go to arrive at mature phases. This might relates to its origin. Relatively, the theory basis of geography per se is weaker. At the same time, the tourism phenomenon are in fact too complex. If we want to understand its essence, we have a long way to go. But this is the thing to inspire researchers to study further.(2)The research on geography of tourism in the West appears along with the emergence of modern tourism phenomenon and develops along with the development of modern tourism. Despite of learned bias, the appearance of research on geography of tourism is later than the emergence of tourism phenomenon.(3)The fact that researchers of geography of tourism are divorced from geography department seriously affects the development of geography of tourism in the subject of geography. We must become aware of the trend.