DIGITAL COMMUNICATION IN TOURISM

TOURISM DISCOURSE

TOURISM AS LANGUAGE FOR SPECIAL PURPOSES

Tourism as specialized discourse, the specialist use of language in contexts which are typical of a specialized community

TOURISM DISCOURSE

TOURISM AS PROMOTIONAL LANGUAGE

Tourism discourse persuasive rather than specialized, resort to multimodality

TOURISM DISCOURSE AND THE NET

HYPER-TEXTSLINKSWEB 2.0VIRTUAL EXPERIENCE

MULTIMODALITY IN PROMOTIONAL TOURISM GENRE

The layout of promotional tourist texts follows a very precise composition plan.

Z-reading pattern (Kress and van Leeuwen, 2004)

Z-READING PATTERN AND HYPERTEXT ANALYSIS

The framework introduced by Kress and van Leeuwen is of difficult application when texts are uploaded on the Net;

We still read information following the Z-reading pattern but hyperlinks can cause interference problems.

INTERACTIVITY interferes with the usual division between Given/New, Ideal/Real and Centre/Margins.

OFFICIAL TOURIST WEBSITES

Britain is one of the top ten tourist destinations in the world (eighth top-ranking position);

London, Edinburgh and Manchester were the three top destinations in the United Kingdom in the period 1999-2011;

The official websites of the mentioned Tourism Boards have followed a similar path.

2003

2007/2008

2011

VISUAL ANALYSIS - 2003

The official tourist websites for London and Edinburgh are divided into sections following the Ideal/Real and Given/New schemes;

The layout of the homepage of the Manchester's official website is completely static;

In the whole sub-corpus, there is scarce use of images and evaluative adjectives;

Websites corresponds to an informative brochure.

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2007/8

In all the three websites the relationship between images and texts is much more evident than in the previous corpus;

Persuasion is realised through evaluation websites are used to promote/sell the destination but still provide practical information;

The division of Given/New and Ideal/Real is successfully realized by the Manchester Tourism Board;

The 2007 version of this website is dynamic and attractive thanks to the alternation of text and pictures.

VISUAL ANALYSIS - 2011

The 2011 visitlondon.com site Unbalanced relationship between visual and verbal elements;The 2011 edinburgh.org site Uncharacteristically long text, represented as the pivot around which all events take place;

The 2011 visitmanchester.com site The least traditional one, complete disruption of traditional reading practices;There is no single reading pattern, the traditional linearity of the reading process is disrupted. Meaning-making is not univocal but depends on readers' semiotic strategies.

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2016: visitlondon.com

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2016: visitlondon.com

The official tourist website for London has been strongly renovated but the unbalanced representation of visual and verbal elements remains;

The website is divided in sections where potential tourists can find a broad range of offers and practical information;

Massive use of red, blue and white = the Union Jack;

At the top of the homepage we have big images representing some of the most important attractions of the area (London Eye, Stonehenge, London's nightlife) in the Given part and a list of activities (Best of London) in the New section.

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2016: edinburgh.org

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2016: edinburgh.org (2)

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2016: edinburgh.org (3)

The homepage is no more divided into frames and it is constructed in a completely different way than the 2008-2011 versions;

The official tourist website of the Edinburgh Tourist Board is more informative/promotional and less sales-oriented than visitlondon.com;

Massive use of white, blue (= Scottish flag) and violet (= Scottish thistle) as we can see in the picture of the Forth Bridge;

A sequence of moving landscapes welcome the visitors (Ideal part) but the text (Real) has maintained a central role.

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2016: visitmanchester.com

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2016: visitmanchester.com (2)

VISUAL ANALYSIS 2016: visitmanchester.com (3)

The 2016 version of the Manchester Tourist Board site is very similar to the 2011 one. It confirms the innovative nature of the website launched five years ago;

The complete disruption of traditional reading practices is still present;

However, the page does not scroll by itself anymore;

The frame entitled Manchester Now is no longer present and it has been substituted by another one where the facebook page of Visit Manchester is shown;

Social networks have more space and importance than in the other two analyzed sites.

Conclusions

Iconic language is more and more important in communicating tourist destinations to potential visitors;

The three analyzed websites share common features but are significantly different. This could suggest the presence of different pragmatic purposes for each site. Destinations are also able to transmit their personality through their homepages layout;

Even if websites have been improved since 2011, they have maintained their core characteristics. It could suggest that destination websites reached their maturity. Could a further innovation led to readability and usability problems?