1. The Leisure Experience
RLS 300
Lecture 2

2. The Leisure Experience
What is a leisure experience?
The Experience Economy (Pine & Gilmore, 1999)
Agricultural/Agrarian economy
Goods-based economy
Service economy
Experience economy
Transformation economy

3. The Leisure Experience
We are at the heart of commercial leisure experiences.
Where can one go here to have a leisure experience?
Pine and Gilmore (1999) suggest that service providers can be considered actors staging an experience for participants.
Service providers give structure to the program, which will impact the client’s experience.

4. Phases of the Leisure Experience
Anticipation
Marketing
Individuals get an image of what to expect
Participation
The actual event
Reflection
Telling other’s what you’ve experienced
Personal thoughts and ideas regarding the event

5. The Leisure Experience
BIG QUESTIONS OF THE DAY:
How do we make these experiences happen?
How do we evaluate whether one has had a leisure experience?

6. Symbolic Interactionism
“Leisure experiences are believed to be dynamic and to emerge throughout the interaction process” (Lee and Shafer, 2002).
We are engaged in a social process
Interaction
Constructing meaning
Creating a meaning
Situational interpretation of objects

7. Symbolic Interactionism
We are involved in a social production of meaning
Symbols, words, meanings, language
Understanding the social process is critical to planning a leisure experience. We must be able to effectively produce an occasion that is meaningful for the participants.