Backpacking, social media, and crises: a discussion of online social convergence

The use of social media during a disaster or crisis event has become a topic of interest among scholars from various disciplines, including recent studies in tourism. The purpose of this paper is to explore how backpackers travelling in the midst of the crisis have used social media and how friends and family seeking information about the travellers have used this emerging media. The discussion is situated within a conceptual framework based on the concepts of ‘collective intelligence’, ‘Digital Social Convergence’, and ‘Hyperawareness’. Two main case studies of backpackers caught in a crisis are presented: a natural disaster (the Chilean earthquake in 2010) and political violence (the violence surrounding the protests in Bangkok in 2010)