A welcome letter to all leisure friends

Dear World Leisure Journal Readers,

Dear Leisure Researchers, Students, Enthusiasts.

In June 2022, I was appointed as Editor-in-Chief of the World Leisure Journal (WLJ). It was a bit of a surprise, because coming from Brazil I never expected that such role would be available for me. One of the barriers I perceived was that English is my second (or third) language (I was fluent in Italian before I started to learn English). Furthermore, in the past, I always looked at editorial roles with a degree of scepticism. In my early days in academia, I believed that the Editor-in-Chief was invariably occupied by a white, English-native, male Professor. Of course, I also need to acknowledge my privilege as a white man in a field that still needs to be more diverse. Indeed, a paper I recently co-authored demonstrates that Leisure journals still lack diversity in their Editorial Boards (Carnicelli & Uvinha, 2023). However, at the same time, in recent years I have seen colleagues including Atara Sivan, Heather Gibson, Catheryn Khoo, Cathy Hsu, Donna Chambers, and Sara Dolnicar doing amazing things and really transforming the fields of leisure, tourism, and hospitality with outstanding editorship, support to early career researchers, and promoting opportunities to scholars from the Global South. Indeed, the first and most urgent action I had to take in my Editor-in-Chief role was to diversify the World Leisure Journal Editorial Board. I prioritized this action because it is intrinsically linked to how I believe leisure research and knowledge development should go forward.

The Anglophonic world still knows close to nothing about leisure research and knowledge in the Global South. Anglophonic researchers (mostly) limit themselves to what is written in English and published in what they see as “top” journals according to lists that classify journals based on contested metrics. On the other hand, the Anglophonic publishing system excludes those from the Global South who are not fluent in English. At this stage, you may be thinking “how cynical is Sandro criticising the publishing system while editing a journal that only accepts papers in English?”. Well, that is one of the biggest aims (and challenges) of my tenure. Can we publish papers in multiple languages? Can we use technology and Artificial Intelligence to facilitate that? Can we develop partnerships with journals in other countries to re-publish some of their papers in English? Can we allow them to publish our paper in their language free of cost? Can we make sure we break barriers that exclude?

If we consider the publication of academic journals (and here I have many criticisms to the current neoliberal logic of academic publication) I believe that they play two important roles. First, they are an important tool for the communication of ideas, science, and knowledge. Second, they can encourage and stimulate practical changes in the research agenda, in research paradigms, but also in, for example, policy and the teaching curriculum. This is an exciting time to do Leisure research. The revolution that technology is creating with the Metaverse and new Artificial Intelligence tools like ChatGPT will keep transforming our leisure experiences but also what and how we communicate our leisure knowledge and experiences. Changes in geo-political relations after the COVID-19 pandemic and the rise of authoritarian governments are generating debates about leisure rights, freedom, and privacy. COVID-19 also significantly changed our work-relations, working contracts, and working rights. Digital Nomandism and “Bleisure” are more popular than ever while we see a corrosion of working rights. We need to critically analyse all these different phenomena.

As Editor-in-Chief of the World Leisure Journal, I hope I can contribute to the development of the field. I passionately believe that the research we publish can contribute to positive social change, influencing policy and practice. In order to do that we need to reach more people from different fields, from different geographies, and engage even more with those people working outside academia. I hope to work with colleagues in other journals to support Early Career Researchers (ECRs), and academics from the Global South, reduce gender inequalities in academia and creating a more inclusive field of study. Dear friends, we need to be more incisive in positioning Leisure as an essential part of our lives. We need to re-centre leisure inside our homes, work environments, and educational systems. Finally, if you have managed to read to this point in the text remember that the journal is here for you. So, please contact us whenever you want. I am here for you. The fabulous Nerea Rojas, our support staff is here for you. Our amazing Editorial Board, who are real ambassadors for the field, are also happy to talk to you and support you. Collectively, we will keep improving leisure research, making it even more impactful, helping to transform people’s lives, and support the fight for a more just, equitable, ethical, and kind world.