The Concept of Leisure Cross-culturally: An Examination of Leisure Terms Across Three Languages
Open Access
- Author:
- Purrington, Andrew
- Graduate Program:
- Recreation, Park and Tourism Management
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- None
- Committee Members:
- Garry Chick, Dissertation Advisor/Co-Advisor
Benjamin Daniel Hickerson, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
Robert William Schrauf, Committee Member
George Robert Milner, Special Member - Keywords:
- Leisure
Recreation
Meanings
Culture
Cross-Cultural - Abstract:
- Individuals in every culture across the world participate in activities not directly related to survival, including dancing, games, play, and socializing. Such leisure activities may have important implications for cultural development and evolution, physical and mental health, and the management of life stressors. To gain a better understanding of leisure, it is important to determine the meanings associated with the word and related terms across groups. For example, academics may view the terms differently than non-academics. It is important to know whether or not members of other linguistic traditions have words for the concept of leisure or related terms. The purpose of this study is to study the meanings associated with leisure terms among academics, non-academics, and speakers of Chinese and Persian. The present study consists of three steps. First, I had researchers identify words related to leisure as well as characteristics associate with the term. Second, I created a survey measuring the perceived similarity of the terms among a sample of academics and a sample of non-academics. Third, I had native speakers of Chinese and Persian complete a translation/back-translation task using the terms in order to identify possible translations of the domain terms for each language. The findings suggest the academic and non-academic samples share some similarities in their perceptions of the leisure terms domain. Both groups appear to agree, overall, on which terms belong in the domain. They also tend to view the domain terms as representing concepts or experiences that are enjoyable and that provide opportunities for freedom. However, there are also distinct differences in the perceived similarities of the words as well as the meanings associated with those words. The word pastime appears to not belong to the leisure terms domain in the minds of non-academics. Academics and non-academics also hold different views regarding how the words amusement and entertainment relate to the other words in the domain. With respect to the translations, both languages appear to have more-or-less direct translations for the word leisure. However, the Persian language appears to have a somewhat smaller vocabulary for leisure domain terms than does Chinese.