Please join us (in person or on Teams) for a research seminar featuring Samantha Senda-Cook, a Professor in the Department of Communication Studies and an affiliated faculty member with the Environmental Science and Sustainability programs at Creighton University.
The topic for Sam's presentation will be:
Time to Face the Cold: Constructing Dog Sledding as an Opportunity for Last Chance Tourism and Edgework
Environmental threats like the climate crisis are reshaping how people see the world. Rhetoric about disasters has sparked a desire among privileged tourists to see places before they are gone. Called “last chance tourism,” this trend constructs some places as both desirable and vulnerable.
Dog sledding offers not only a unique way to experience the cold, it can also satisfy the need to test one’s mettle. Through stories, mushers construct dog sledding as both peaceful and risky, which positions it as a means for edgework among professionals and amateurs. Edgework describes when people seek out high-risk situations to push themselves and experience something novel or unique. The cold, then, features centrally in the construction of dog sledding because it facilitates both last chance tourism as well as edgework. While many mushers and hobbyists mourn the effects of the climate crisis, tourists seek out ways to experience diminishing snow and cold.
This presentation will detail material and emotional constructions linked to the context of dog sledding and how they create the conditions to experience the cold in some of the fastest warming places on the planet.