Academic Inertia: Resisting Change in Tourism Studies

In this paper, the authors challenge the business-oriented transformation of higher education and question the sustainability of critical thinking in academia amid toxic hegemonic structures. Drawing on our experiences as a research team, and reflecting on a TRINET discussion thread, our paper critiques the celebration of citations and its impact on the next generation of scholars. We advocate for a critical social justice turn in tourism studies, challenging systemic racism within qualitative methods. The influence of Western Eurocentric ideologies and methodologies in research is critiqued, particularly within the APA's historical role in perpetuating systemic racism and eugenics. We conclude with a personal reflection and a call for a deeper dialogue, engagement, collaboration, and coalition building during the TTRA Qualitative Research Workshop to push back against oppressive systems in higher education.