‘From the Flames to the Light’: 100 years of the commodification of the dark tourist site around the Verdun battlefield

Sandrine Virgili, Hélène Delacour, Frédéric Bornarel and Sébastien Liarte

Annals of Tourism Research, 2018, vol. 68, issue C, 61-72

Abstract: In order to contribute to research on dark tourism, this article details the process of commodification of a dark site by adopting a supply approach. We empirically apply the dark tourism spectrum (Stone, 2006) to the battlefield of Verdun in France from 1916 to 2016. In doing so, we shed light on the relationship between the temporal distance from the tragic event and potential economic exploitation. Our findings reveal that commodification is possible from the very creation of the site and becomes more complex as temporal distance increases, notably due to the multiplicity of stakeholders and their incompatible interests. Our results contribute to the improvement of the dark spectrum; we add the stakeholders' structure as a new and dynamic attribute.

Keywords: Dark tourism; Supply; Commodification; Verdun; Stakeholders (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:anture:v:68:y:2018:i:c:p:61-72

DOI: 10.1016/j.annals.2017.11.005

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