Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Time Off: The Social Experience of Time on Vacation

  • Published:
Qualitative Sociology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This article explores the phenomenological and socially constructed experience of time during the finite period of the vacation. Temporal routine is considered as a form of social control from which vacations and similar breaks for time off offer opportunities for agency and release. In-depth interviews, participant observation, and a narrative analysis of vacation blogs are used to analyze norms in orientation to time while one is away from select constraints of everyday life. Approaches to time while on vacation are found to fall into two ideal types: those who may “ignore” time and find release from schedules and routine, and those who must closely attend to its passage. Influences of duration, frequency and pace are also central in moderating experience.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. I would like to thank an anonymous reviewer for the distinction between free areas and free intervals.

  2. During the time I was employed about 50 % of the clientele at the resort were Japanese. This is a standard figure for Waikiki which attracts many Japanese tourists. About 43.9 % of all visitors to Oahu at the same time the prior year were Japanese (Hawaii Tourism Authority, 2009). Although they made up at least half of my customers on any given day I elected not to include this population in my study due to linguistic limitations (their English was usually extremely limited, as was my Japanese) and my inadequate cultural knowledge about Japan.

References

  • Adler, Patricia, and Peter Adler. 2004. Paradise laborers: Hotel work in the global economy. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aron, Cindy Sondik. 1999. Working at play: A history of vacations in the United States. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brekhus, Wayne. 1998. A sociology of the unmarked: Redirecting our focus. Sociological Theory 16(1): 34–51.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brisset, Dennis, and Robert Snow. 1993. Boredom: Where the future isn’t. Symbolic Interaction 16(3): 237–256.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bruner, Edward. 2005. Travel Stories Told and Retold, in Culture on Tour: Ethnographies of Travel, 1–29. Chicago: University of Chicago Press

  • Caillois, Roger. 1960. Man, play and games. New York: Free Press of Glencoe.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cocker, Mark. 1992. Loneliness and time: British travel writing in the twentieth century. London: Secker and Warburg.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, Stanley, and Laurie Taylor. 1976. Escape attempts: The theory and practice of resistance to everyday life. London: Allen Lane.

    Google Scholar 

  • Csikszentmihalyi, Mihalyi. 1975. Beyond boredom and anxiety. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

    Google Scholar 

  • Csikszentmihalyi, Mihalyi. 1981. Some paradoxes in the definition of play. In Play as context, ed. Alyce Cheska, 14–26. West Point: Leisure Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dann, Graham. 1999. Writing out the tourist in space and time. Annals of Tourism Research 26(1): 159–187.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Desforges, Luke. 2000. Traveling the world: Identity and travel biography. Annals of Tourism Research 27: 926–945.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Desmond, Jane. 1999. Staging tourism: Bodies on display from Waikiki to sea world. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Durkheim, Emile. 1915/1965. The elementary forms of religious life. New York: Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Eriksen, Thomas Hylland. 2001. Tyranny of the moment: Fast and slow time in the information age. London: Pluto Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fine, Gary Alan. 1996/2009. Kitchens. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Flaherty, Michael. 1999. A watched pot: How we experience time. New York: New York University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Flaherty, Michael. 2011. The textures of time: Agency and temporal experience. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gibson, Heather, and Andrew Yiannakis. 2002. Tourist roles: Needs and the lifecourse. Annals of Tourism Research 29(2): 358–383.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Goffman, Erving. 1961. Asylums: Essays on the Social Situations of Mental Patients and Other Inmates. Oxford, England: Doubleday.

  • Gottlieb, Alma. 1982. Americans’ vacations. Annals of Tourism Research 9: 165–187.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hall, Edward. 1983. The dance of life: the other dimension of time. New York: Anchor Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hubert, Henri. 1905/1999. A brief study of the representation of time in religion and magic. In Essay on time. Oxford: Durkheim Press.

  • Kane, Maurice J., and Hazel Tucker. 2004. Adventure tourism: The freedom to play with reality. Tourist Studies 4: 217–234.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lauer, Robert. 1981. Temporal man: The meaning and uses of social time. New York: Praeger.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leach, Edmund. 1961. Two Essays concerning the Symbolic Representation of Time, in Rethinking Anthropology, 124–136. New York: Athlone Press.

  • Lett Jr., James. 1983. Ludic and liminoid aspects of charter yacht tourism in the Caribbean. Annals of Tourism Research 10: 35–56.

    Google Scholar 

  • Löfgren, Orvar. 1999. On holiday: A history of vacationing. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Lyman, Stanford, and Marvin Scott. 1970. A Sociology of the absurd. New York: Appleton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Melbin, Murray. 1978. Night as frontier. American Sociological Review 43(1): 3–22.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Merton, Robert. 1976. Sociological ambivalence and other essays. New York: Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mizruchi, Ephraim. 1983. Regulating society: Marginality and social control in historical perspective. New York: Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Munt, Ian. 1994. The ‘Other’ postmodern tourism: Culture, travel and the new middle classes. Theory, Culture and Society 11: 101–123.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Neumann, Mark. 1983. Living on tortoise time: Alternative travel as the pursuit of lifestyle. Symbolic Interaction 16(3): 201–235.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nimrod, Galit. 2008. Retirement and tourism: Themes in retirees’ narratives. Annals of Tourism Research 35(4): 859–878.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nippert-Eng, Christena. 1996. Home and work: Negotiating boundaries through everyday life. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pearce, Philip, and Faith Foster. 2007. A university of travel: Backpacker learning. Tourism Management 28(5): 1285–1298.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pike, Kenneth. 1967. Language in relation to a unified theory of structure of human behavior. The Hague: The Netherlands.

  • Reece, William A., and Michael A. Katovitch. 1989. Untimely acts: Extending the interactionist conception of deviance. Sociological Quarterly 30: 159–184.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rojek, Chris. 1993. Ways of escape: Modern transformation in leisure and travel. Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rugh, Susan Sessions. 2008. Are we there yet?: The golden age of american family vacations. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rybczynski, Witold. 1991. Waiting for the weekend. New York: Penguin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schwartz, Barry. 1970. Notes on the sociology of sleep. Sociological Quarterly 11(4): 485–499.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Simmel, Georg. 1971 [1911]. On individuality and social forms. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Snow, Robert, and Dennis Brissett. 1986. Pauses: Explorations in social rhythm. Symbolic Interaction 9(1): 1–18.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sorokin, Pitrim, and Robert Merton. 1937. Social time: A methodological and functional analysis. American Journal of Sociology 42(5): 615–629.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tucker, Hazel. 2005. Narratives of Place and self: differing experiences of package coach tours in New Zealand. Tourist Studies 5(3): 267–282.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Urry, John. 1990. The tourist gaze: Leisure and travel in contemporary societies. London: Sage Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  • Walker, Katherine. 2000. ‘It’s difficult to hide it:’ The presentation of self on internet home pages. Qualitative Sociology 23(1): 99–120.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Waugh, Linda. 1982. Marked and unmarked: A choice between unequals in semiotic structure. Semiotica 38(3/4): 299–318.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wearing, Stephen, and John Neil. 2000. Refiguring self and identity through volunteer tourism. Society and Leisure 23: 389–419.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zerubavel, Eviatar. 1981. Hidden rhythms: Schedules and calendars in social life. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zerubavel, Eviatar. 1985. The seven day circle: The history and meaning of the week. New York: Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Zerubavel, Eviatar. 1987. The language of time: Toward a semiotics of temporality. Sociological Quarterly 28: 343–356.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Eviatar Zerubavel and three anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Sociology, Rutgers University, 26 Nichol Avenue, New Brunswick, NJ, 08901, USA

    Karen Stein

Authors
  1. Karen Stein
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Karen Stein.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Stein, K. Time Off: The Social Experience of Time on Vacation. Qual Sociol 35, 335–353 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11133-012-9228-2

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11133-012-9228-2

Keywords

Search

Navigation