Alan Machin: Tourism As Education

A reviewer on the US Amazon web page for Making Sense of Tourism: 1 The Beckoning Horizon:

"I had intended originally just to dip into this book and read the chapters that especially interested me - but in the end they all did, and I read it from cover to cover. The author obviously has a first hand and very practical knowledge of all he writes about, and I particularly liked the anecdotes from people he had met, as this really brought the book to life. I was interested by the comments that the spread of books and newspapers, better travel arrangements - even the growth of coffee houses - in the 18th century, all promoted an interest in tourism in their own way. A most intriguing question posed was whether, if plantations had been open to tourists, slavery in the southern States would have survived as long as it did. As a former history teacher I led many field trips, and if I had known some of the secrets of how the professionals approach tourism to make it interesting from the beginning of the journey to the end, I am sure my visits would have been even more fascinating for the children.

"If you want to know where we are going, you have to know where we have come from, and how we got to be where we are today. As far as tourism is concerned, The Beckoning Horizon does exactly this. The book, which is impressively self-published under the publishing name of Westwood Start provides a thorough and detailed account of how the phenomenon that is tourism has emerged and what the educational benefits of travel have been throughout the ages.

Travel and tourism as essential strands of life long learning and understanding of self and others is a key theme which emerges throughout this text, which is itself a hefty scene setter in a series of three texts that will tell the story of tourism from past, present and hopefully future perspectives. This particular text tells the story of tourism up to around the time of the Great Exhibition, but also drawing upon numerous 20th and 21st Century parallels.

The book is part memoir, reflecting upon a life working and participating in fields related to travel and tourism by the author, combined with numerous very well researched and referenced stories, details and facts about the various aspects which came together to form the phenomenon that is tourism. Numerous areas are covered within the book including: pilgrimages - ancient and not so ancient; the educational impacts of tourism; the grand tour; the industrial revolution; health tourism particularly in relation to water based attractions; culture and cultural awareness and education; tourism as an enabler of societal change; recollections and recording of tourism experiences; and the Great Exhibition of 1851.

The written style is extremely readable and accessible throughout, largely avoiding high brow academic terminology for wording that makes this book (which is full of interesting and well researched facts) very easy to read, enjoyable and rewarding, which many 'text' type books simply are not.

Alan Machin's book brings real credibility to the self-publishing of academic texts.... I have enjoyed reading it, and learned much from it. I believe that this book should be on the reading lists of any travel, tourism and leisure type courses, as well as any courses relating to social history in Britain, Europe and the USA. I look forward to reading the follow-up."