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Given the rapid diffusion and adoption of AI-driven tools across numerous contexts, including tourism marketing, AI-based storytelling has quickly spread in tourism-related practices and communications. However, the theoretical understanding of its strategic communication and meaning construction remains underdeveloped. The current literature has been highly instrumental, prioritising viewpoints based on efficiency, scalability and personalisation, while leaving a critical theoretical challenge and gap regarding the roles of authenticity, narrative agency, engagement and advocacy behind. Consequently, this conceptual article fills this gap by theorising that AI-mediated storytelling is actively involved in the co-construction of destination engagement and evangelism. Different theoretical backgrounds and streams, including narrative theory, engagement theory and critical tourism marketing and communication research, form the foundation of this work. It outlines how narrative transportation moderates the relationship between AI-based storytelling and authenticity. It also points out the risks concerning narrative homogenisation and epistemic obscurity. Opening lines for future research, this article develops a conceptual framework in the context of narrative coherence and destination evangelism, contributing theoretically to the tourism and marketing literature as well as providing a systematic foundation for the analysis of AI storytelling as a strategy and ethically underlying communicative actions.
Soliman et al. (Sun,) studied this question.