Beyond the Grand Tour: re-thinking the education abroad narrative for US higher education in the 1920s. (2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Contreras, Eduardo
• Is Part Of: International journal of tourism anthropology. Volume 4:Number 3(2015)
• Page Start: 238
• Page End: 251
• Publication Date: 2015
• Subjects: study abroad -- Grand Tour -- travel -- tourism -- USA -- United States -- higher education -- education abroad -- 1920s -- knowledge acquisition -- US undergraduates; Culture and tourism -- Periodicals; Tourism -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; 306.481905
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1759-0442

Abstract

This paper utilises primary source documents from the first officially sanctioned US study abroad programs in the 1920s to argue that the discourse about the first study abroad programs for US students was a break from the Grand Tour tradition of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Instead, this paper suggests that study abroad represented an experimental and innovative approach to the acquisition of knowledge for US undergraduates. The discourse of those who created these programs and those who participated was distinct from the Grand Tour in three ways that are described in the paper as, distinct by design, distinct by omission and distinct by experience. These three areas of distinction refute the contemporary narrative that conflates the Grand Tour with study abroad.