Spiritual and Religious Tourism: Motivations and Management

This book reviews tourist motivations for making religious or spiritual journeys, and the management aspects related to them. It explores sacred journeys across both traditional religions such as Christianity and Islam, and newer forms of pilgrimage, faith systems and quasi-religious activities such as sport, music and food. Demonstrating to the reader the intrinsic elements and events that play a crucial role within the destination management process, it provides a timely re-assessment of the increasing interconnections between religion and spirituality as a motivation for travel. The book: - Includes applications, models and illustrations of religious tourism and pilgrimage management for converting theory into good practice; - Addresses theories of motivation and why travel to religious destinations has increased; - Explores key learning points from a selection of international case study perspectives. Providing researchers and students of tourism, religious studies, anthropology and related subjects with an important review of the topic, this book aims to bridge the ever-widening gap between specialists within the religious, tourism, management and education sectors.

With over 25 years' experience in events delivery, in public and private sectors, since 2007, Ruth has taught events management. Her PhD study is on the role of events in church culture. As an events practitioner, Ruth developed considerable leadership expertise and has over 25 years' experience in events delivery in the UK, in both public and private sectors, having managed thousands of events, including 11 years managing a venue. In 2007, Ruth moved into teaching events management at the UK Centre for Events Management, and became a level leader, with pastoral responsibility for Level 5 and later for final year students. She led the successful development and delivery of the online Masters Course in Events Management in 2008, as well as being Course Leader 2009-2011 of the BA (Hons) Conference & Exhibition Management, Course Leader of the BA (Hons) Events Management, and HND Events Management 2011-2014. Ruth is a priest in the Church of England, and her PhD studies focus on the role of events in church culture.

M. Jabar Yaqub is a senior lecturer at Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK. His MSc thesis, undertaken at Sheffield Hallam University, investigated motivations of pilgrims that attended the annual pilgrimage of Hajj. He has extensive personal experience in travelling to sacred sites, including Makkah and Medina to conduct the Hajj in Saudi Arabia, and also several other sites in the Middle East. His academic qualifications are in international events management. His research interests are in mega and major events, religious tourism and religious events.

Dr Razaq Raj is Principal Lecturer for Research and Enterprise in Leeds Business School. He is an internationally renowned academic with extensive experience in teaching, research, leadership and Managements in the UK, Malta, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany, China, Japan and South Korea. He is an Honorary Professor University of Vitez, Bosnia. He has published work on strategic management, economic and financial impacts, cultural festivals and sustainable tourism and religious tourism. He has both organised international conferences and delivered keynote speeches. He has published books on Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage Management and Events Management. He is founding co-editor of the Journal Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage and Series Editor, CABI Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage Book Series and Tourism and Society Book Series.

is editor in chief of International Journal of Safety and Security in Tourism (UP Argentina) and International Journal of Cyber Warfare and Terrorism (IGI-GlobalUS). Besides being Senior Researcher in the Department of Economics at University of Palermo, Argentina, he is a global affiliate of the Tourism Crisis Management Institute (University of Florida, US), the Centre for Ethnicity and Racism Studies (University of Leeds), The Forge (University of Lancaster and University of Leeds UK) and The International Society for Philosophers, hosted in Sheffield UK. With more than 700 published papers and 25 books, Korstanje was awarded as Outstanding Reviewer 2012, International Journal of Disaster Resilience in the Built Environment, University of Salford, UK; Outstanding Reviewer 2013, Journal of Place Management and Development, Institute of Place, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK and Reviewer Certificate of Acknowledgement 2014, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management (IJCHM), University of Central Florida, US. Now he co-edits almost 10 specialized journals in such themes as human rights, mobility, tourism and terrorism. Korstanje is subject to biographical records for Marquis Who's Who in the World since 2009. He has been nominated for 5 honorary doctorates for his contribution in the study of the effects of terrorism in tourism. In 2015 he was awarded Visiting Research Fellow at the School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Leeds, UK and the University of La Habana, Cuba. In 2017 he was elected as Foreign Faculty Member of AMIT, Mexican Academy in the study of Tourism, which is the most prominent institution dedicated to tourism research in Mexico. Now he works as an editorial advisory board member of Cambridge Scholar Publishing UK and IGI Global US.

Kevin Griffin is the Senior Lecturer in Tourism in the School of Hospitality Management and Tourism at Technological University Dublin. Kevin Griffin is the chairperson of the Institute for Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage which organises an annual conferences and manages a number of publication projects. He is also Editor-in-Chief for the TU Dublin published International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage which is internationally recognised and ranked with SCOPUS and many other agencies. He is also Series Editor for the Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage Book Series. In more recent times Kevin has established two other international Open Access Journals for which he is also Editor-in-Chief: The International Journal of Tour Guiding Research and the International Journal of Islands Research.