Heritage Tourism and Education
ATLAS Special Interest Group
Heritage Tourism and Education
The coordinators for this SIG are:
Adrian Guachalla – London Metropolitan University, United Kingdom
Gai Jorayev – Macao University of Tourism, Macao SAR, China
This SIG (active since 2017) is interested in any topic concerning the education and training in heritage and tourism. Listed below are illustrative of our interests but the list is not exhaustive:
- Production and consumption of heritage, tourism and heritage tourism knowledge
- Social justice, neo-liberalism, power-knowledge, politics of representation in education content
- ‘Buzzwords’ and tourism education: sustainability, resilience, pro-poor, community-based…
- Quality assurance and control, effective communication, pedagogic techniques, technologies and paradigms in academic and professional tourism and heritage education
- Tourism and education programmes in degree granting institutions
- Site manager training for UNESCO World Heritage sites
- Tour(ist) guide and heritage interpreter training
- Disciplinary concerns and explorations: Excavating Anthropology, Architecture and Geography and other academic disciplines from professional and academic tourism and leisure courses (eg. ‘the Geography in Tour Guiding’)
- The role of tourism schools in their communities
If you want to contact the SIG coordinator, please fill in the form HERE
If you want to join this SIG, please fill in the form HERE
ATLAS SIG Soundbite 6 – Heritage Tourism and Education
In the ATLAS SIG Soundbites series the different ATLAS Special Interest Groups tell about their SIG.
Annual review of activities – 2026
The Heritage Tourism and Education SIG successfully organised a Special Track at the ATLAS annual conference, “Tourist Destinations at a Crossroads: Space, Community, Products, Politics and Evolutionary Processes in the Age of Transitions”, held in Vila-seca, Spain, from 17 to 20 June 2025. Contributions included research on contested colonial heritage, religious heritage tourism, world heritage policy, community empowerment through heritage tourism, sustainable island tourism through heritage education, and the interface between tangible and intangible musical heritage. The Special Track brought together a rich range of case studies and innovative methodological approaches, resulting in forward-thinking discussion and knowledge exchange across diverse aspects of heritage tourism research.
The SIG also co-organised a webinar with the Dark, Orphanage and Volunteer Special Interest Groups, entitled “Consuming Lives, Consuming Places: A Debate on the Shadows of Travel”, on 5 March 2026. The event included keynote contributions from leading researchers in dark tourism, children’s rights and protection, sustainable volunteer tourism, and ethical cultural heritage tourism development. The webinar created an inclusive and accessible platform for engagement with contemporary perspectives and research, bridging current issues and debates in ethical volunteering, heritage protection, dark tourism, child welfare, and human rights.
The Heritage Tourism and Education SIG has also partnered with the Dark Tourism SIG to organise a Special Track at the upcoming ATLAS annual conference, “Community, Collaboration and Co-creation in Times of Crisis”, to be held in Leeds, UK, from 23 to 26 June 2026. The Special Track, titled “From Dissonance to Design: Ethics, Evidence, and Care across Dark & Heritage Sites”, has received numerous proposals and continues to bring together case studies, research advances, and contemporary issues in dark heritage tourism development.
The Special Interest Group also extended a warm welcome to Dr Gai Gorayev of the Macao University of Tourism, who joins Dr Adrian Guachalla as a SIG coordinator.We also hope to develop a track for the ATLAS Annual conference in 2027.