Introduction: Knowledge Production and Disciplines

Scholars interested in tourism have been criticised for a lack of interest in the ontological and epistemological (and hence methodological) foundations of their work, including the notion that some tourism knowledges are created for tourism knowledges’ sake in a fragmented, incoherent and unsystematic manner (Tribe, 2006; Weed, 2006). But the indictment reads further: as a consequence, research on tourism has been limited in its ability to contribute substantively to the development of social theory, concept and hence deeper understanding (Franklin & Crang, 2001; Ioannides, 2007).

Such allegations form part of a debate about how knowledges of tourism can and indeed should be produced (cf. Coles et al., 2006). A more prominent feature of this discussion is whether there is a coherent and clearly identifiable academic discipline centred on, and defined by its interest in, tourism; or, alternatively, is knowledge about tourism as a field of study generated by scholars within and across (other established) academic disciplines? An impasse has been reached and the conflicting positions are characterised by their contrasting approaches towards defining academic disciplines (e.g. Tribe, 1997, 2000; Leiper, 2000; Hall et al., 2004). Fundamentally, though, the need for and existence of disciplines is taken as read when they should not be (Klein, 1996). In this chapter, we explore the opportunities and possibilities for the study of tourism ‘beyond disciplines’; that is, post-disciplinary studies of tourism (see also Coles et al., 2005, 2006). We consider the relevance of recent discussions, particularly in the social sciences, on knowledge production characterised by more reasonableness, flexibility and freedom from the constraints of established and orthodox disciplinary boundaries and dogmas (Sayer, 1999; Massey, 1999; Toulmin, 2001; Hellström et al., 2003). Several academic disciplines as we know them today originate in the late 19th and early 20th century.