NeuGastro Current Issue

The number of gastronomy tours, which are organized for the purpose of promoting local foods and local culture, which are an important element of attraction for tourists to choose the destination and gain experience, and which contribute to both tourism and rural development, is increasing every year. Therefore, especially in recent years, it has become important for tourist guides to become more involved in gastronomy tourism, to specialize and to provide effective information to tourists about gastronomic products and services. In this direction, the concept of gastro-guidance has emerged as a new concept and combines gastronomy tourism and tourism/tourist guidance disciplines. In this study, it is aimed to make a bibliometric analysis of the studies on gastro-guidance in Türkiye and to examine the subject of gastroguidance. Studies between 2003 and 2023 were reviewed and a total of 23 studies, 18 of which were articles and 5 of which were graduate theses, were included in the research. Due to access restrictions, books and/or book chapters and papers presented at congresses or conferences were not included in the scope of the research. Bibliometric analysis parameters such as the distribution of the studies within the scope of the research according to the years they were published, their research methods and research scope, the number of authors, and the authors' universities were used. Data were graphed using the Excel program. As a result of the research, it was concluded that quantitative research methods were mostly used in studies on gastronomy and that the research mostly focused on tourist guides' perceptions of gastronomy tourism. In addition, it has been observed that studies on gastroguidance have increased in intensity in the last five years. In Türkiye, which has three cities in the field of gastronomy on the UNESCO Creative Cities List and is a destination with high gastronomy tourism potential, it is believed that qualified research on gastroguidance will contribute to both the stronger and more diverse literature and the sector.

Human beings have created a culture of beliefs in terms of the continuation of life by expressing the belief in holiness brought by creation, the beings they consider sacred in the oral tradition and transferring them from generation to generation through myths, and expressing the beliefs that are the basic elements of culture, sometimes with symbols and sometimes with rituals. With the new understandings brought about by modernization, the traditional religious understanding of society has evolved into a more rational understanding of religion, bringing religious life to the brink of extinction. As societies evolve from traditional to modern structures, these beliefs have weakened or lost their social meaning. Within this context, the central aim of this study is to shed light on a theoretical framework by considering the history, geographical structure and folk culture of Sarıveliler district from the perspective of Phenomenology of Religion. In essence, this study seeks to illuminate the traditional belief system of the Sarıveliler, taking into account the geographical and historical structure of the region. Sarıveliler, which gained district status on May 27, 1990 with Law No. 3644, has eighteen neighborhoods, seven villages and one town, and the proximity of these settlements to each other draws attention. In terms of its geographical location, Sarıveliler community emerged amidst the rugged foothills of the Taurus Mountains in a region with an average altitude between 1500 and 1650 meters. In this research endeavor, we aim to unravel the folk beliefs and cultural practices of the district from the perspective of Phenomenology of Religion, traditional rituals, ceremonies, prayers and myths in the region are discussed. It also focuses on how local people perceive and express the relationship between nature and spirituality. In this context, it focuses on the belief systems and customs of the local population of the people in the region to understand how the religious and cultural heritage of Sarıveliler was shaped and how it is kept alive today. In this way, the religious and cultural diversity of the district is understood and an in-depth look at the cultural identity of the region is presented. The main purpose of the study is to record the forgotten folk beliefs of Sarıveliler.

Meeting consumer service quality expectations and ensuring satisfaction is possible with employees who have received quality tourism training in professional and technical terms. However, while the number of educational institutions that will meet the sector's need for qualified people has been increasing in recent years, the fact that some of the graduates do not have a career idea in the sector or that many employed tourism graduates leave their jobs after working in the sector for only a few years is a serious problem regarding the employment of educated tourism. This study, which approaches the causes of this problem from the perspective of young individuals' perceptions of the education they receive, was carried out with the aim of both finding a solution to the employment problem and increasing the success of educational institutions. The aim of the study is to find answers to the questions of how satisfied undergraduate students are with the education they receive regarding their future careers and to what extent their career expectations are met. The findings of this research, in which the perceptions of 28 students from 4 different departments of the Faculty of Tourism of a state university were tried to be determined by semi-structured qualitative interview technique, were obtained by content analysis. Participating students' evaluations were examined in 6 dimensions. These; "choice processes", "career awareness related to their fields", "career ideas regarding the education they received", "whether the courses they took are useful for their career goals", "to what extent their career expectations are met" and "suggestions for the quality of education". The participants' thoughts were evaluated and compared on a section-by-section basis. At the end of the study, it was concluded that Recreation Management students' desire and awareness levels were lower than other department students regarding their department selection processes and career awareness. On the other hand, it was revealed that half of the participants thought that the courses taken and their content were problematic in terms of their career goals. It was found out that the students who criticized the most on this issue were Gastronomy, Culinary Arts and Recreation Management students. Various suggestions were made in line with the findings.

Today, social media holds a significant place in individuals' daily lives, with a large portion of their social interactions occurring on online platforms. As social media use increases, its negative effects on individuals are being increasingly researched. Notably, concepts such as problematic social media use (PSMU) and fear of missing out (FoMO) have gained attention. PSMU is defined as the inability to control social media use, which negatively impacts daily activities, while FoMO is characterized by the fear of missing out on developments in one's social environment, leading to excessive social media use. This study aims to examine the influence of gender and social media usage duration on PSMU and FoMO, as well as the relationship between these two variables. The research is a quantitative and cross-sectional study utilizing a relational survey method. The population consists of university students studying at Necmettin Erbakan University's Faculty of Tourism. Data were collected from a total of 208 students through surveys. The analysis provided descriptive information about the participants, and reliability and normality tests were conducted for the scales used. T-tests and MANOVA analysis were performed to identify differences between variables. The findings indicate that students' PSMU levels significantly differ concerning their daily social media usage duration, and a significant relationship between FoMO and PSMU was identified. As daily social media usage increases, the likelihood of encountering PSMU also increases. Additionally, FoMO was found to have a weak predictive power on PSMU. These findings suggest that managing social media use and improving digital literacy skills could play a crucial role in reducing the adverse effects of PSMU and FoMO. This study's results highlight the importance of careful management of social media use and digital literacy education.

Today, practices such as eco-tourism, eco-labelling, cittaslow, slowfood have started to be adopted by tourism stakeholders to ensure the sustainability of tourism. These practices are among the factors affecting the demand for sustainable tourism as a new trend. Therefore, all stakeholders providing services, especially tourism enterprises, benefit from practices that support sustainable tourism in order to attract domestic and foreign tourists. One of the practices that support sustainable tourism is the slow food approach. Slow Food has emerged as a movement that encourages the preservation of local food, eating habits and the characteristics and biodiversity of local ecosystems and local ecosystems to be transferred to future generations. The concept of metaphor was first used in the 1980s by Lakoff and Johnson in the study titled "Metaphors We Live By". Metaphor is the explanation of a concept, phenomenon or event by analogy with another concept, phenomenon or event. Metaphors are considered as a tool that people use to explain how they see life, environment, events and objects by using different analogies. Within the framework of this literature, the aim of the research is to determine the perceptions of cookery programme students about the concept of "slow food" by using metaphors. The research was carried out with 106 students studying at Yozgat Bozok University, Department of Hotel, Restaurant and Catering Services. A semi-structured questionnaire form was prepared in the research. The collected data were analysed by thematic content analysis method. As a result of the research, 7 different metaphors were obtained. The metaphors obtained were grouped as seasonality, local product, different taste and flavour diversity, sustainability, alternative, geographical sign and source of income. As a result, all of the metaphors developed by the students are positive. This shows that the students adopt new approaches in the food and beverage sector and that they are open to change and development. In this direction, suggestions were presented for the expansion of the study.

Salt is one of the oldest known spices in human history. It has been determined that there is a salt shaker in the ancient city of Çatalhöyük, located in Çumra district of Konya province. Salt, which contains many minerals, has positive and negative contributions to human health. Salt is used for flavoring purposes in meals, salads and many products. Apart from sweetening purposes, it is known to be among the oldest known food preservation methods in the world. Apart from food, salt has some religious meanings. Salt is considered sacred both in true religions and in other religions. This sacred acceptance has contributed to many salt-related rituals becoming a tradition. It is known that in Judaism, apart from Islam, meals start with salt, and this situation is similar to Islam. In addition to religions, sects have developed and implemented many rituals regarding salt. One of these sects is the Mevlevi sect, which dates back 800 years. It is known that there are many rituals about salt in Mevlevi order. One of these rituals in Mevlevi culture is to start and end the meal with salt. This tradition, which is a Mevlevi ritual, is still a practice continued by many people. Based on this ritual, today Hz. It is known that visitors can take/leave salt for abundance in the tomb of Ateşbaz-ı Veli, Mevlana's cook and the first person in the world to have a mausoleum built in his name. Visitors believe that they will find healing and abundance with this salt they buy from the tomb. Many literary, historical and gastronomic studies have been conducted on the subject of salt, and the number of these studies will continue to increase in the future. This study will contribute to studies on salt. Within the scope of the study, 14 people were interviewed. In light of the findings; It has been determined that in Mevlevi order, rituals related to salt continue, and some businesses in Konya even tell their guests about the salt ritual before and after the meal. It has been determined that the rituals performed with salt in different religions are similar to each other.