Dictionary of Travel, Tourism & Hospitality (3rd ed.)

Citation

Ingram, H. (2003), "Dictionary of Travel, Tourism & Hospitality (3rd ed.)", International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 15 No. 7, pp. 413-414. https://doi.org/10.1108/09596110310496079

There can be few hospitality and tourism professionals and academics whose lives have not been affected in some way by Professor (Rick) Medlik. He was instrumental in founding the first hospitality degree course at the University of Surrey in the 1960s and has published widely since then. The first edition of Medlik’s Dictionary of Travel, Tourism and Hospitality appeared in 1993, with a second edition in 1996, and this third edition may, sadly, be his final book. The purpose of the book was, and remains, to “provide … clear explanations of the meaning of the commonly used words and phrases in travel, tourism and hospitality for those concerned with those fields in one way or other. As these sectors have continued to flourish and develop in the last decade, the need for a common understanding between people and nations becomes ever more important.

The dictionary is divided into six parts. The first part takes up two‐thirds of the book, providing 4,000 entries with alphabetical explanations of terms used in travel, tourism and hospitality. The entries consist of three main types: those drawn from the social sciences (mainly economics and geography), terms from particular industries and occupations, and finally terminology from the hospitality and travel practice. The entries include abbreviations, acronyms and specific terms that comprise a treasury of information that may be useful to the student or the practitioner. For example, did you know that the unit of currency in Panama is the Balboa (B), or that a ryokan is a traditional Japanese inn? Yet this is more than a resource for a pub trivia quiz, because Medlik has taken great pains to define terms in common usage whose meaning may be interpreted differently. For example, the term hospitality is defined in the preface as “the provision of accommodation, food and drink for people away from home for reward”.

Parts 2 and 3 provide a list of 300 international and national organizations ranging from tourist boards to trade unions, together with their initials and Web site address, where appropriate. In part 5 Medlik lists biographical profiles of 100 people who have somehow affected the hospitality and tourism industries. This “who was who” section covers the great and the good from authors and politicians to chefs and hoteliers. Part 5 steers the reader through the tricky waters of acronyms and abbreviations, with more than 1,000 alphabetical entries. More useful and dynamic information is provided in part 6 with listings of the 200 countries of the world, including the area, population, capital and currency. Finally, part 7 offers a bibliography of dictionaries, directories and yearbooks, manuals, sources of statistics, books and journals.

Collections of lists such as this make surprisingly compelling reading, because it is easy for the casual reader to find a new slant on something familiar or else to discover something new. Whatever the reason, the third edition of Medlik’s book is even better, and is an invaluable reference to everyone remotely concerned with the travel, tourism and hospitality industries.