Mutant Mobilities: Backpacker Tourism in ‘Global’ Sydney

Abstract

This essay explores the complex mobilities of contemporary backpackers. Backpackers are not just tourists; they are also frequently students, working holidaymakers, highly skilled professional workers, and even, at times, long‐term semi‐permanent residents. How to define this group of physically and conceptually mobile travellers is often problematic, especially for local authorities. It is difficult to discern what cultural space and identity this type of mobility and this category of traveller occupy. Focusing on the tensions in residential communities which have developed as a result of backpackers not only travelling through but frequently dwelling in place, the essay analyses the ‘backpacker phenomenon’ as a complex and mutating mix of working, holiday and residential experiences that needs to be understood within a framework of increasing(ly) uneven, diverse and contested mobilities.

Keywords:

• Mobility
• place
• urban culture
• backpackers
• working holidaymakers
• ‘global’ Sydney
• cultural politics of occupancy

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to acknowledge the funding assistance of the Australia Research Council (Linkage Project) and the contributing partners: City of Sydney Council, Manly Council, North Sydney Council, Randwick City Council, Waverley Council, Woollahra Municipal Council.

Notes

1. In 2004, 760 million legal international tourist arrivals were recorded. See www.world‐tourism.ord/newsroom/Releases/2005/january/2004numbers.htm. This figure is predicted to increase to 1.6 billion in 2020. See www.world‐tourism.org/facts/eng/vision.htm

2. It is important to note that rather than offering a totalising, blanket description of the contemporary world, Sheller & Urry's (2006) ‘new mobilities paradigm’ suggests ‘a set of questions, theories, and methodologies’. This is a distinction that we support in this essay.

3. ‘Backpackers’ are not the same as working holidaymakers although the terms are often used interchangeably. In Australia, Working Holiday is a visa class (class 417). ‘Backpackers’ are defined as ‘international visitors who spent at least one night in hostel type accommodation’ (Bureau of Tourism Research, 1997).

4. ‘Backpacker Tourism in Global Sydney’ is an Australian Research Council Linkage Project being conducted in partnership with six municipal councils in Sydney. The authors are the primary researchers engaged on the project. For more information about the project see: www.uws.edu.au/ccr/backpacker