Tourism, holidaymaking and travel are these days more s social phenomena than most commentators have considered. On the face of it there could not be a more trivial subject for a book. inde since social scientists have had considerable difficulty explaining such as work or politics, it might be thought that they would have great difficulties in a for trivial phenomena such as holidaymaking. However, there are interesting parallels the s of deviance. This involves the investigation of bizarre and social practices which happen to be defined as deviant in some societies but necessarily in others. The assumption is that the investigation of deviance can reveal interesting and significant aspects of'normal' societies. It could be s that a similar analysis can be applied to