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- Exploring the micro-politics of place: lifestyle migrants, collective identities and modes of belongingPublication . Torkington, KateTaking up Hopkins and Dixon’s (2006) call to attend to the micro-politics of everyday constructions of space and place, which necessarily involves psychological concepts such as identity, belonging and attachment, this paper aims to show how a critical socio-cognitive approach to discourse analysis is an effective means of unpacking the ways in which versions of place are (re)produced and negotiated through discursive practices, and in particular the ways in which ‘legitimate’ collective identities are constructed in relation to place. I focus on the contemporary social phenomenon of lifestyle migration. Within Europe, this typically involves relatively affluent northern Europeans moving to destinations in southern Europe that are strongly linked to tourism. Although lifestyle migrants are generally viewed by their hosts as ‘desirable’ migrants due to their perceived economic and socio-cultural capital, their integration into destination communities is often minimal. The question arises as to how these migrants construct modes of belonging in relation to their adopted home-place and how they relate to the other social groups with whom they share it. Using texts from a variety of sources, including in-depth interviews with British migrants in Portugal, I explore not only how migrants position themselves (and others) discursively in relation to places, but also how they are already positioned by discursive practices in the public sphere. I also examine to what extent the construction of a ‘legitimate’ mode of belonging involves the construction of intergroup cooperation within that place.
- Defining lifestyle migrationPublication . Torkington, KateThis paper seeks to provide a conceptual framework for studying migration to the Algarve by Northern Europeans. ‘Lifestyle migration’ is suggested as a generic term for this trend, which is part of a recent but flourishing global social phenomenon. I also point to the glaring gap in the literature as far as empirical studies based in the Algarve are concerned, and make suggestions for a research agenda.
- ‘A true feeling of authentic portuguese golf'? The discursive construction of the Algarve region in portuguese golf websitesPublication . Pereira, Rosária; Ribeiro, Filipa Perdigão; Torkington, Kate; Dias, Joana AfonsoIn an increasingly competitive global marketplace, the need for golf destinations to differentiate themselves from competitors has become more critical than ever. This paper raises questions about the promotional strategies employed by the golf sector in the Algarve, focusing on internet communication strategies, since this medium has become the biggest driving force towards the commoditisation of all aspects of the tourism experience. By offering a complementary perspective to the field of (critical) tourism studies, and drawing on a qualitative, multi-modal discourse analysis, this work-in-progress looks at the particular ways that representations and images presented on the Algarve golf websites constitute and frame identities (of people and places) and socio-spatial relationships. This paper analyses a corpus of 45 texts collected from official websites of the 40 Algarve golf courses and from five entities which promote the Algarve as a golf destination, along with the golf images that are displayed alongside them. Findings point to salient discursive and visual representations of a global setting enjoyed by the global elite. Whereas the courses‟ positioning in relation to their regional competitors draws on similar discursive strategies which reflect those used in tourism advertising discourses in general – e.g. reiteration of explicit comparisons, superlatives and hyperbolic statements -, representations of local emplacedness are not salient; in some cases local place seems to have been almost intentionally suppressed.
- Faro National Capital of Culture (FCNC 2005) and Tourism - reflections on the profile of tourists who attended the eventsPublication . Ferreira, Ana Maria; Martins, Ana Isabel; Gonçalves, A. R.; Perdigão, F.; Torkington, Kate; Pereira, Luis Nobre; Martins, Paula VenturaThis paper presents and reflects on some of the results obtained from a study conducted 0ver a 6 month period. The study focused on the tourists who visited the Faro National Capital of Culture. Between March and December 2005, a total of 154 events and attractions (with a total of 2513 sessions) including art exhibitions theatre, concerts, dance and cinema, took place in Faro and other towns throughout the Algarvian region, Although FCNC 2005 was not specifically project as a tourist related event, the fact that the Algarve is the most important tourist region of Portugal together with the concentration of most of the session over the summer months, which constitute the tourism high season, meant that many of events were well attended by tourist.
- Place and lifestyle migration: the discursive construction of ‘glocal’ place-identityPublication . Torkington, KateInternational lifestyle migration is a rapidly growing worldwide phenomenon. Within Europe, increasingly large numbers of northern Europeans are moving south in search of what they perceive as a better quality of life. The typical representation of this form of migration suggests that it is consumption-led, tourism-related and leisure-based; it is to be located within late modern, global, elitist, borderless and highly mobile social practices. The question arises as to the role of local place in this type of migration process and in the construction of individual and collective social identities. Using data from advertising texts produced by a residential-tourism resort and from in-depth interviews with British residents in the Golden Triangle area of the Algarve, Portugal, this article explores the relationships between discourse, identity, g/local place and lifestyle migration.
- The discursive construction of place-identity: british lifestyle migrants in the AlgarvePublication . Torkington, KateThis thesis takes an interdisciplinary, critical discourse analysis (CDA) approach to investigate the discursive construction of place-identity. For the purposes of this research, place-identity is understood as the relationship between the discursive construction of place and the discursive construction of the multiplicities of the individual and collective self. The main data is provided by interviews with British lifestyle migrants in the Algarve, Portugal. I develop a framework for investigating both the individual and the collective dimensions of migrant place-identity by combining elements from Systemic Functional Linguistics (in particular Appraisal theory) and Cognitive Linguistics. This allows an analysis of both strategic features of the micro-level of discourse, such as evaluation of place(s), and apparently less conscious features, such as the use of spatial deixis. I draw on Positioning Analysis as a means of linking micro- and macrolevels of analysis. At the micro-level, the findings suggest that various modes of belonging are constructed in interaction by positioning the self as being attitudinally aligned (or not) with place(s) and by positioning the self as being (literally and metaphorically) inside/outside place(s). The macro-level context of the research is the growing contemporary trend of lifestyle migration, which is strongly related to tourism mobilities. Since this social phenomenon is fertile ground for the production of privileged, elite identities, one of the aims of this thesis is to expand the agenda of CDA research by developing an understanding of how such privileged identities are articulated, (re)produced, reinforced and negotiated through discursive positionings, and how these positionings are linked to hegemonic discourses that ‘legitimise’ certain types of migration. The study thus aims to show how the discursive construction of place-identity is not only an integral part of the discursive construction of migrant identities, but also how place-identity is linked to broader ideologies and contributes to the politics of place.
- A place in the sun? Discursive constructions of positive outcomes in post-migration stories in the AlgarvePublication . Torkington, Kate; Ribeiro, Filipa PerdigãoThis study argues for more comparative research between seemingly different migrant groups, bringing a new focus on intra-European migration in Portugal by examining and comparing the reasons why migrants from different geographical origins choose to settle in the tourism-based Algarve region. Drawing on data collected from a questionnaire survey and interviews, the study first compares the profiles of two apparently distinct migrant groups - Northern and Eastern Europeans - and goes on to explore their discursive representations of migration experiences. Findings reveal that despite differences in initial motivations for moving to the Algarve, there are similarities between the two groups in terms of what leads them to settle in the region. Among both groups there is a high level of positive place-identity, suggesting that the specific context of the destination place plays a significant role in positive post-migration outcomes, something which is often overlooked in migration studies. Furthermore, the lived and perceived lifestyle affordances of the destination place, especially when discursively compared with the place and lifestyle left behind, are flagged by both groups and lend support to the idea that the role of lifestyle in migration has a wider significance than is usually credited.
- Heroes and villains: discursive strategies for (re)producing ‘myths’ of national identity in the newspaper coverage of international footballPublication . Torkington, KateThe aim of this paper is to explore, taking a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) approach, some of the discursive strategies employed by British newspapers to construct representations of national identity and unity in the reporting of a major sporting event. Taking the concept of ‘nation’ to be ‘imagined’(Anderson 1983) and thus an ‘ideologically constructed’ social group (Billig 1995), this paper considers how social representations serve to (re)produce myths of national identity through the reinforcing of national stereotypes based on narratives of heroes, villains and their deeds and the construction of social representations of in‑groups and out‑groups. The analysis presented in this paper supports the argument that the representation of social actors and action in news stories is clearly ideologically situated and can be used to great effect to cognitively reinforce a sense of ‘us’ v. ‘them’, a fundamental element of myths of national identity and the reiteration of collective national unity.