Fergus Maxwell MA Thesis Oral Presentation - "Seizing the Horizon: Co-operative Tourism and the Production of Picturesque Space"

ABSTRACT
Emerging in the mid-eighteenth century, picturesque discourse produced a series of discrete spatial units of ostensibly untouched nature. By the 1890s, this picturesque space coordinated the leisure practices of a mass audience, with globe-spanning itineraries managed not only by travel agencies like Thomas Cook & Son Ltd., but also by the likes of the Co-operative Holiday Association and the Holiday Fellowship, co-operative tourism organizations explicitly oriented towards servicing a working-class membership. As these co-operatives facilitated access to picturesque space, they also engaged in its reproduction, and opened possibilities for its counterhegemonic appropriation. Examining magazines, routebooks, and popular accounts contained within the fonds of the Co-Operative Holidays Association and the Holiday Fellowship at the Manchester County Record Office, I argue that this potential for the recontextualization of the perceived and conceived space of co-operative travel is subtly apparent.

Advisor: Dr. Kevin James

Chair: Dr. Alan Gordon

Committee Member: Dr. Pam Perkins, University of Manitoba

External Examiner: Dr. Christina Smylitopoulos, SOFAM