Understanding Motivations and Benefits of Attending a Multicultural Festival

This study explores why people attend a multicultural festival and what benefits they perceive they gain from attending such a festival. Semistructured in-depth interviews were conducted with festival visitors of a multicultural festival held in Adelaide, Australia. A multilayered structure of motivation and benefit themes was identified through thematic content analysis of the interview data; differences of motivations and benefits of attending the multicultural festival were found between festival visitors whose self-identified ethnic cultures were represented at the festival and those whose cultures were not featured. The study suggests that multicultural festival visitors gain broad festival experiences that lead to enduring benefits that center around the development of multiculturalism values. This study contributes to the literature in theorizing a context-driven approach in festival visitor studies through exploring context-specific visitor motivations and benefits at multicultural festivals.