Graduation trips : how do they inform self-identity?

Abstract

This paper explores how graduation trips serve to reflect the active construction of self-identity in late modernity, following the works of Giddens (1991). Issues such as the tourist experience, the meanings conferred upon the trip, how the trip allows respondents to effectively narrate their sense of self and the impacts upon their lives were explored. In-depth interviews are conducted on 13 graduates who are already in full-time employment. The findings suggest that the transitional period, the destination choices, forms of travel and narratives of experience are central to the construction of the self. This includes creating identities through differentiation and reflexivity.