Top

Published in:

2021 | OriginalPaper | Chapter

13. Cruising and Clanning: The Motorcycle Tourism Tribal Experience

Author : Diane Sykes

Published in: Consumer Tribes in Tourism

Publisher: Springer Singapore

Activate our intelligent search to find suitable subject content or patents.

search-config

AI-assisted search

Off

Abstract

The motorcycle lifestyle is best conceived as a subculture, and there are a vast number of riding groups and clubs within that subculture that have formed around specific interests. Motorcycle tourists are a neo-tribe within the larger subculture that may or may not be affiliated with clubs or other neo-tribes. Motorcyclists share values, beliefs, symbols, narrative, and common lifestyle aspects. They also engage in common rituals. Among motorcycle tourists, members who form smaller tribal groups enjoy a shared passion and the desire to affiliate with like-minded people. Since all members of such a sub-tribe remain members of more comprehensive neo-tribes, the concept of clan formation is a more apt application. As motorcycle tourists travel, they may ride with their neo-tribe or they may form a new mobile clan for a particular trip or occasion. Furthermore, new clans may form on a temporary basis at a particular event or activity such as the annual ‘Pig Roast’ at Steel Steeds Motorcycle Campground in Pennsylvania (USA). This article challenges traditional notions of clan formation in a mobile society and argues that stability and continuity can be achieved at a temporal event that occurs annually and serves as the nexus for clan formation. Trust forms within the mobile communal relationship where members share experiences and rituals. Members may self-identify and self-segment joining different clans creating a multi-level communal experience. This clanning and neo-tribal behaviour is explored within the context of a motorcycle campground. Businesses that can provide spatial locations and activities for motorcycle tourism sub-tribes can form clan-like relationships within this community.

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 102.000 Bücher
über 537 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Automobil + Motoren
Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 67.000 Bücher
über 340 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

previous chapter The Cycling Tourism Tribe

next chapter Water-Sport Tribes in Multi-Sport Destinations: The Case of the Lake Garda, Italy

Austin, D. M. (2009). Ritual and boundary distinction in a recreational community: A case study of motorcycle rallies and riders. Qualitative Sociology Review, 5, 71–93

Austin, D. M., & Gagne, P. (2008). Community in a mobile subculture: The world of the touring motorcyclist. In N. Denzin (Ed.), Studies in symbolic interaction (vol. 30, pp. 411- 437). Emerald, Bingley.

Austin, D. M., & Gagne, P. (2010). Playing with the guys: Women’s negotiations of gendered leisure and space. International Journal of Motorcycle Studies, 6(2). https://web.archive.org/web/20180424013326, http://ijms.nova.edu/Fall2010/IJMS_Artcl.GagneAustin.html

Austin, D. M., Gagne, P., Orend, A. (2010). Commodification and popular imagery of the biker in American culture. The Journal of Popular Culture, 43(5), 942–963. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5931.2010.00781.x:

Bauman, Z. (1992). Intimations of postmodernity. Routledge, London. Available viahttps://search.ebscohost.com.libauth.purdueglobal.edu/login.aspx?direct=trueanddb=nlebkandAN=83121andsite=eds-live Accessed: 28 Jan 2019

Cater, C. I. (2013). Motorcycle tourism in ceredigion. A report presented at the Motorcycle Tourism Forum for the Tourism Society of Wales hosted by the Aberystwyth Motorcycle Action Group.

Cater, C. I. (2017). Tourism on two wheels. Patterns of motorcycle leisure in Wales. Tourism Management, 1(61), 180–189.

Chan, A. (1997). Corporate culture of a clan organization. Management Decision, 35(2), 94–99. https://doi.org/10.1108/00251749710160232.

Chandler, N., Csepregi, A., Kasa, R., & Heidrich B. (2017). Separated out? A quest into the basis for subculture formation in higher education. Paper presented at EURAM Glasgow.

Clans of Ireland. (n.d). Gatherings. https://www.clansofireland.ie/baile/content/gatherings.

Council of Scottish Clans and Associations Inc. (n.d). Cosca—Home https://www.cosca.scot/.

Cox, G. R. (2012). Culture, place and identity in a mobile community. [dissertation]. University of New Hampshire. Available from https://scholars.unh.edu/dissertation/663/

Dolles, H., Dibben, M. R., Hardy, A. (2018). Motorcycle racing and Neo-Tribes at the Isle of Man. In Neo-Tribes (pp. 119–134). Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

Drif, A., Boukerram, A., Slimani, Y., Giordano, S. (2017). Discovering interest based mobile communities. Mobile Networks and Applications, 22(2), 344–355. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11036-017-0811-3.

Franck, T. M. (1996). Clan and superclan: Loyalty, identity and community in law and practice. American Journal of International Law, 90(3), 359–383. https://doi.org/10.2307/2204063.

Gil-White, F., Gurven, M., Henrich, J., Power, C., & Tracer, D. (2004). Party peoples. New Scientist, 184(2479), 50–53.

Goulding, C., Shankar, A., & Canniford, R. (2013). Learning to be tribal: Facilitating the formation of consumer tribes. European Journal of Marketing, 47(5/6), 813–832. https://doi.org/10.1108/03090561311306886

Hardy, A., & Robards, B. (2015). The ties that bind: Exploring neo-tribal theory’s relevance to tourism. Tourism Analysis, 20(4), 443–454.

Hardy, A., Bennett, A., Robards, B. (2018). Introducing contemporary neo-tribes. In: A. Hardy, A. Bennett & B. Robards (Eds.), Neo-Tribes: Consumption, Leisure and Tourism. (p. 1–14). Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.

Hardy, A., Gretzel, U., & Hanson, D. (2013). Travelling neo-tribes: Conceptualising recreational vehicle users. Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, 11(1–2), 48–60.

Heding, T., Knudtzen, C., & Bjerre, M. (2009). Brand management: Research, theory and practice. New York: Routledge.

Heim, B., Joosten, M., Richthofen, A. V., Rupp, F. (2018). Land-allocation and clan-formation in modern residential developments in Oman. City, Territory and Architecture, 5(1), 8. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40410-018-0084-6.

Hung, W. L., Lee, Y. J., & Huang, P. H. (2016). Creative experiences, memorability and revisit intention in creative tourism. Current Issues in Tourism, 19(8), 763–770.

Hull, L. (2015). Highland games and gatherings. Faces [Internet]. [cited 2019 Nov 14]; 32(1), 22. Available from: https://search-ebscohost-com.libauth.purdueglobal.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f5h&AN=109031518&site=eds-live

Kirsch, L. J., Ko, D. G., & Haney, M. H. (2010). Investigating the antecedents of team-based clan control: Adding social capital as a predictor. Organization Science, 21(2), 469–489.

Lange K. (2015). “Bedouin” and “Shawaya”: The performative constitution of tribal identities in syria during the French mandate and today. Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, 58(1–2), 200–235. https://doi.org/10.1163/15685209-12341370.

Lehtonen, M. J., & Harviainen, J. T. (2016). Mobile games and player communities: Designing for and with clans. Design Management Review, 27(3), 20–26. https://doi.org/10.1111/drev.12033.

Litz, R. A., & Stewart, A. C. (2000). Where everybody knows your name: Extraorganizational clan-building as small firm strategy for home field advantage. Journal of Small Business Strategy. 11(1), 1–3. https://libjournals.mtsu.edu/index.php/jsbs/article/view/436. Retrieved 14 Nov 2019.

Maffesoli, M. (1995). The time of the tribes: The decline of individualism in mass society. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Maxwell, A. H. (1998). Motorcyclists and community in post-industrial urban America. Urban Anthropology and Studies of Cultural Systems and World Economic Development, 1, 263–299.

Munoz, J. R., Griffin, T., & Humbracht, M. (2017). Towards a new definition for visiting friends and relatives. International Journal of Tourism Research, 19(5), 477–485. https://doi.org/10.1002/jtr.2110.

Ouchi, W. (1980). Markets, bureaucracies, and clans. Administrative Science Quartery, 25(1), 129–141. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2392231.

Price, J., & Cybulski, J. L. (2007). The Influence of Neo-Tribalism on Participatory Design. In H. Österle, J. Schelp, R. Winter (eds.) Proceedings of the 15th European Conference on Information Systems (pp. 795–806). ECIS. St. Gallen: University of St. Gallen.

Primm, E. The American bad-ass: A social history of the biker [dissertation on the Internet]. University of Colorado at Boulder. [cited 2007 Aug 11] Available from ProQuest Digital Dissertations database. (Publication No. AAT 3123278).

Riyahi, M., & Mehrad, A. (2017). The life style amongst nomadic tribes of Ivan Kalhor, Iran Journal of Educational, Health and Community Psychology, 6(1), 34–39. https://doi.org/10.12928/jehcp.v6i1.6641.

Rihova, I., Buhalis, D., Gouthro, M. B., & Moital, M. (2018). Customer-to-customer co-creation practices in tourism: Lessons from customer-dominant logic. Tourism Management, 1(67), 362–375.

Robards, B., & Bennett, A. (2011). My Tribe: Post-subcultural manifestations of belonging on social network sites. Sociology, 45(2), 303–317. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038510394025.

Schlee, G. (1993). Inter-ethnic clan identities, ethnicity, centrisms and biases: A response to Paul Spencer. Africa, 63(4), 591–600.

Schouten, J. W., & McAlexander, J. H. (1995). Subcultures of consumption: An ethnography of the new bikers. Journal of Consumer Research, 22(1), 43–61.

Soanes,R., & Marak, Q. (2013). The clan system in a matrilineal society its organization, importance and functions. Oriental Anthropologists, 13(1).

Solomon, M. R. (2007). Consumer behavior: Buying, having, and being (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall.

Sykes, D. M., & Kelly, K. G. (2014). Motorcycle tourism demand generators and dynamic interaction leisure. International Journal of Culture, Tourism and Hospitality Research.

Sykes, D. M., & Kelly, K. G. (2016). Motorcycle drive tourism leading to rural tourism opportunities. Tourism Economics, 22(3), 543–557.

The Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary. (2020). Clan. In Merriam-Webster.

Walker, L. (2010). Tourism and leisure motorcycle riding. In B. Prideaux & D. Carson (Eds.), Drive Tourism (pp. 146–158). New York: Routledge.

Weaver, A. (2011). The fragmentation of markets, neotribes, nostalgia, and the culture of celebrity: The rise of themed cruises. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 18(1), 54–60.

Williamson, O. E. (1975). Markets and hierarchies. Analysis and antitrust, implications. New York: Free Press.

Xue, L., Gao, J., & Kerstetter, D. (2018). Neo-tribalism outside the stadium: A fluid community of tailgaters. In A. Hardy, A. Bennett, & B. Robards (Eds.), Neo-Tribes (pp. 105–117). Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

Title: Cruising and Clanning: The Motorcycle Tourism Tribal Experience
Author: Diane Sykes
Publisher: Springer Singapore
Book: Consumer Tribes in Tourism
Print ISBN: 978-981-15-7149-7

Electronic ISBN: 978-981-15-7150-3

Copyright Year: 2021
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7150-3_13