Experience staging and symbolic knowledge: The case of Bornholm culinary products

• Autores: Jesper Manniche, Karin T Larsen
• Localización: European Urban & Regional Studies, ISSN-e 1461-7145, Vol. 20, Nº. 4, 2013, págs. 401-416
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • The ongoing changes in Western food markets and the emergence of �alternative� agri-food production�consumption systems have been conceptualized in numerous ways but very rarely in terms of an �experience turn�. This article applies the perspective offered by the concept of the experience economy and empirically analyses the development and marketing of culinary products from the Danish island of Bornholm as production-side activities in a larger �territorial staging system� which at consumption-side primarily relates to urban consumers. A second analytical focus is on the knowledge aspects of experience-based economic activities. The knowledge aspects of the coordinated staging activities of Bornholm firms, business networks and governance actors are studied by use of the differentiated knowledge bases taxonomy, which includes a category of socio-cultural �symbolic� knowledge, complementary to the technological and scientific types of knowledge important for developing functional assets of products. The data and analyses suggest that the experience economy perspective can enrich the research on alternative food production systems by directing attention to the crucial role of strategic, coordinated staging of experiences that reach the consumers in and outside the region. Second, the article shows that the innovation and staging of experience offerings and authenticity-based products relies on symbolic knowledge dynamics in creating and communicating commercially relevant cultural values and meanings and that the sources of such knowledge dynamics are not only local but to a large extent extra-regional and multi-scalar. These findings are indications of new opportunities, barriers and external linkages for rural areas.