Constructing and performing hotel hospitality culture. Issue 1 (1st March 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Laerdal, Kirsti Margrethe; Palmer, Catherine; Lester, Jo-Anne
• Is Part Of: Hospitality & society. Volume 12:Issue 1(2022)
• Page Start: 3
• Page End: 26
• Publication Date: 2022-03-01
• Subjects: Hospitality industry -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; Hospitality -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; 338.4791
• DOI: 10.1386/hosp_00043_1
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2042-7913

Abstract

This article discusses the social processes underpinning the co-construction and performance of hotel hospitality culture. The influence of culture within the hospitality sector has inspired conceptual and empirical research resulting in a significant literature base. However, gaps remain in understanding how culture manifests itself through behaviour in the publicly accessible areas of a hotel. This gap was addressed by research designed to uncover the social processes and behavioural dynamics underpinning the construction of hotel culture/s. Informed by social constructionism, a purposeful sampling strategy and a range of qualitative methods were employed: participant observation, a fieldwork diary recording observations of behavioural encounters, conversational and semi-structured interviews. The findings demonstrate that hotel hospitality culture is co-constructed and performed through interactions between people. Two distinct hotel cultures emerged, Second home/extended family and Corporate leisure. The findings provide a deeper, more holistic understanding of how hospitality culture is brought to life in hotels through the taken-for-granted social encounters between people, encounters wherein hospitality is given, received and experienced.