Travel is part of my DNA. I started travelling at a time when Brits still looked at you strangely if you had a suntan. As tourism became a mass phenomenon, I also took full advantage, travelling around Europe and kicking off my career as a research assistant on a PhD project with Chris Devereaux in the Algarve. I went on to work in the industry with my father, who had worked in airlines and hotels, and had set up a tourism research and marketing consultancy (TRAM), which I am still running today.
I was also lucky enough to start my academic career at a time when the EU was beginning to support Erasmus exchanges. That allowed me to meet lots of researchers from different countries and backgrounds, which eventually took me to the Netherlands to work at Tilburg University. In those days, teaching was still in Dutch, so of course I had to learn the language as well. That was my gateway into the culture, and an important basis for learning other languages later on. I set up the Association for Tourism and Leisure Education and Research (ATLAS), which generated yet more international contacts. ATLAS also brought me in touch with Napier, who has been a key member of the network for almost 20 years now. Napier staff were active participants in the ATLAS Cultural Tourism Research Project, and it was cultural tourism that took me to Spain in 2003, with a Marie Curie Post-Doc on festivals in Catalunya. I worked at the Interarts Foundation in Barcelona for a few years and also moved TRAM to Spain.
Coming back to the Netherlands a few years later, I had more contact with Napier, via events research. As my work developed around ‘eventful cities’, Edinburgh became a natural focus for collaboration. From Breda University, we sent groups of students (178 in 2012!) to Edinburgh, where they were ably hosted by Napier staff. The events’ connection with Napier continued through the ATLAS Events Special Interest Group, for which Napier organised a meeting in 2020. Unfortunately, this was during Covid, so I didn’t actually get to Edinburgh! But I did supervise David Jarman’s PhD thesis on Social network analysis and festival relationships together with Jane Ali-Knight. One thing I love about being linked to Napier is catching up with other old friends. These include fellow Visiting Professor Brian King on many research projects over the years, Angela Chu, who worked with Brian and I on cultural tourism and placemaking in the Greater Bay Area of China, and Afiya Holder, who I collaborated with at the UNWTO.
Written by: Professor Greg Richards