Edward Hákon Huijbens

Biography

Edward (born 1976) is currently the director of the Icelandic Tourism Research Centre (ITRC) along with holding and associate professors chair at the department of business and science at the University of Akureyri. Edward completed an MA and subsequently a PhD at Durham University geography department in 2005, graduating in 2006. The department was ranked highest amongst UK geography departments in the UK Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) of 2008 and Edward received a full departmental scholarship along with the prestigious Overseas Research Scholarship (ORS) to pursue his studies there. Edward’s work in Durham departed from his undergraduate emphasis on landscape morphology and delved into spatial theory with fieldwork undertaken in Durham for the MA and Edinburgh’s Festival Square for the PhD. Upon completing the PhD Edward got a post at the University of Iceland, doing research into innovation and entrepreneurship, studying e.g. successful small enterprises and the build up of the Reykjavík heating utility. Mostly though, Edward was teaching courses in both the faculty of science, department of geography and the faculty of business administration and economics. In the former he taught the philosophy of science and cultural geography in the latter he taught innovation and product development and markets and culture. After two years of work Edward was offered a post as the director of the ITRC, which is jointly run by the University of Iceland and the University of Akureyri. The head office is in Akureyri, N. Iceland where Edward is born and raised. Edward assumed the post in autumn 2006 and along with teaching tourism courses and consumer behaviour at the Uni he is involved in various research projects. His main interests lie in innovation, product development and marketing of tourism along with landscape theories and spatial theory. At current Edward is involved in studying health and wellness tourism in the Nordic context, storytelling and the narratisation of destinations, landscape impact studies in relation to geo-thermal and hydropower build up, innovation in tourism at peripheral destinations, destination images and to a lesser extent various marketing survey both small and large of tourism in Iceland. Edward lives in Akureyri with his partner and three children.

Research Interest

Humanities and Social Sciences