a b s t r a c tDiscourses in tourism destination marketing play an important role in constructing and consuming tourism destinations. However, various discursive contradictions can emerge, potentially limiting or facilitating tourism development. This paper has two objectives. First, it aims to identify discursive contradictions embedded in the positioning statements of regional tourism marketing strategy documents. Second, it intends to highlight how such contradictions simultaneously prioritize and destabilize certain destination identities. Employing the case of the Dutch province of Fryslân, discourse analysis of tourism marketing documents was conducted. Findings revealed contradictions emerging along five themes: place branding, identity claims, target groups, roles and collaboration. Regional Frisian tourism marketing appears to prioritize external orientations and homogenizing identities, with limited consideration of geographically proximate markets and a selective perception of internal stakeholders' roles in tourism. Possible implications of such destination positioning are discussed and suggestions are made to balance various positioning orientations in regional place branding.

As one of its main resources, weather is an integral part of tourism. Yet little is known about how individual tourists experience the weather and how it affects the subjective perception of their holidays. The weather appears to have a prominent place in language and the use of the weather in narratives of tourists can provide insight into how the weather affects tourist experiences. Based on a qualitative analysis of online travel blogs written by Dutch tourists, 16 weather themes could be distinguished, representing how the weather was narrated about by tourists. Moreover, different impact themes emerged describing how the weather impacted the tourists: tourists revealed positive, negative or neutral evaluations about the weather impacts. The findings of this study can be used for future research on tourist behaviour and how specific weather types and impacts influence the decision making of tourists in terms of itineraries and activities.

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