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Abstract
Academia has taken two distinct approaches to the social experience of family holiday, emphasizing the moments of togetherness either as the experiences of “just-being-together” or experiences of an escapist realm of family members' immersion into shared activities and fun. Based on 26 in-depth whole-family interviews with Danish, German and Norwegian families on holiday in a Danish holiday home and a conceptual foundation in “flow” and “reversal theory”, this article focusses on the pleasures of being-together from parents' and children's perspectives. The article illustrates that the social experience of family holiday and special moments of togetherness during holiday in a holiday home appear as a composition of reverse pleasures and continuous reversals between excitement and relaxation. An intra-family dynamic of reverse yet interrelated pleasures creating a social balance – or a “family flow” – providing optimal holiday experiences for both parents and children are argued to be an important factor of being together on family holiday.
Acknowledgements
The study is part of a PhD study, included in a research project entitled “Holiday Homes in Future” (www.fremtidensferiehus.aau.dk) and partly funded by EU's Regional Development Fund. The author would like to thank Maria Lottrup and Margret Huschman for assisting with the interviews with German renters. Also thanks to colleagues and the editors of SJHT for constructive feedback and useful comments.