Women traveling alone: the experience of Mexican women travelers
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.25145/j.pasos.2023.21.046Keywords:
women, solo travel, experiences, constraints, opportunitiesAbstract
This qualitative, interpretive study explores the experiences of Mexican women tourists traveling alone within a gendered framework that views women's opportunities and constraints as socially situated, and places women's lives as central to the tourism research agenda. Data were collected from 20 in-depth interviews and a thematic analysis was used to compare and contrast the data. The results revealed two aspects, the first is that the experience of traveling alone allows women to improve their self-perception, gain confidence and experience a sense of accomplishment; on the other hand, it was found that sexualized male attention and fear of insecurity is an important limitation to live an experience of freedom. When experiencing harassment by men in the destinations they visited, women behaved fearful of being attacked or abused, and this limited their use of the recreational space offered at the destination. However, these factors did not deter women from future solo travel plans.
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