Vietnam 08 - 091 - my homestay (3184886982)

Homestay (also home stay and home-stay) is a form of

hospitality Hospitality is the relationship between a guest and a host, wherein the host receives the guest with some amount of goodwill, including the reception and entertainment of guests, visitors, or strangers. Louis de Jaucourt, Louis, chevalier de J ...

and

lodging Lodging refers to the use of a short-term dwelling, usually by renting the living space or sometimes through some other arrangement. People who travel and stay away from home for more than a day need lodging for sleep, rest, food, safety, shel ...

whereby visitors share a

residence A residence is a place (normally a building) used as a home or dwelling, where people reside. Residence may more specifically refer to: * Domicile (law), a legal term for residence * Habitual residence, a civil law term dealing with the status ...

with a local of the area (host) to which they are traveling. The length of stay can vary from one night to over a year and can be provided for free (

gift economy A gift economy or gift culture is a system of exchange where valuables are not sold, but rather given without an explicit agreement for immediate or future rewards. Social norms and customs govern giving a gift in a gift culture; although there ...

), in exchange for monetary compensation, in exchange for a stay at the guest's property either simultaneously or at another time (

home exchange Home exchange, also known as house swapping, is a form of lodging in which two parties agree to offer each other homestays for a set period of time. Since no monetary exchange takes place, it is a form of barter, collaborative consumption, and sh ...

), or in exchange for

housekeeping Housekeeping is the management and routine support activities of running an organised physical institution occupied or used by people, like a house, ship, hospital or factory, such as tidying, cleaning, cooking, routine maintenance, shopping, ...

or work on the host's property (

barter economy In trade, barter (derived from ''baretor'') is a system of exchange in which participants in a transaction directly exchange goods or services for other goods or services without using a medium of exchange, such as money. Economists distingu ...

). Homestays are examples of

collaborative consumption Collaborative consumption is the set of those resource circulation systems in which consumers both "obtain" and "provide", temporarily or permanently, valuable resources or services through direct interaction with other consumers or through a m ...

and the

sharing economy In capitalism, the sharing economy is a socio-economic system built around the sharing of resources. It often involves a way of purchasing goods and services that differs from the traditional business model of companies hiring employees to produce ...

. Homestays are used by travelers; students who

study abroad International students, or foreign students, are students who undertake all or part of their tertiary education in a country other than their own and move to that country for the purpose of studying. In 2019, there were over 6 million internati ...

or participate in

student exchange program A student exchange program is a program in which students from a secondary school (high school) or university study abroad at one of their institution's partner institutions. A student exchange program may involve international travel, but doe ...

s; and

au pair An au pair (; plural: au pairs) is a helper from a foreign country working for, and living as part of, a host family. Typically, au pairs take on a share of the family's responsibility for childcare as well as some housework, and receive a monet ...

s, who provide child care assistance and light household duties. They can be arranged via certain

social networking service A social networking service or SNS (sometimes called a social networking site) is an online platform which people use to build social networks or social relationships with other people who share similar personal or career content, interests, act ...

online marketplace An online marketplace (or online e-commerce marketplace) is a type of e-commerce website where product or service information is provided by multiple third parties. Online marketplaces are the primary type of multichannel ecommerce and can be a way ...

s, or

academic institution Academic institution is an educational institution dedicated to education and research, which grants academic degrees. See also academy and university. Types * Primary schools – (from French ''école primaire'') institutions where children r ...

Advantages and disadvantages

Homestays offer several advantages, such as exposure to

everyday life Everyday life, daily life or routine life comprises the ways in which people typically act, think, and feel on a daily basis. Everyday life may be described as mundane, routine, natural, habitual, or normal. Human diurnality means most peop ...

in another location, the opportunity to experience local culture and traditions, opportunities for

cultural diplomacy Cultural diplomacy is a type of public diplomacy and soft power that includes the "exchange of ideas, information, art, language and other aspects of culture among nations and their peoples in order to foster mutual understanding". The purpose ...

friendship Friendship is a relationship of mutual affection between people. It is a stronger form of interpersonal bond than an "acquaintance" or an "association", such as a classmate, neighbor, coworker, or colleague. In some cultures, the concept o ...

intercultural competence Cultural competence, also known as intercultural competence, is a range of cognitive, affective, and behavioural skills that lead to effective and appropriate communication with people of other cultures.Deardorff, D. K. (2009). ''The Sage handbook ...

, and

foreign language A foreign language is a language that is not an official language of, nor typically spoken in, a given country, and that native speakers from that country must usually acquire through conscious learning - be this through language lessons at schoo ...

practice, local advice, and a lower

carbon footprint A carbon footprint is the total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions caused by an individual, event, organization, service, place or product, expressed as carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e). Greenhouse gases, including the carbon-containing gases carbo ...

compared to other types of lodging; however, they may have rules and restrictions, such as curfews, facility usage, and work requirements, and may not have the same level of comfort, amenities, and privacy as other types of lodging.

Hospitality exchange services

Social networking services where hosts do not receive payments are called hospitality exchange services (HospEx). The relationships on hospitality exchange services are shaped by

altruism Altruism is the principle and moral practice of concern for the welfare and/or happiness of other human beings or animals, resulting in a quality of life both material and spiritual. It is a traditional virtue in many cultures and a core as ...

and are related to the

cyber-utopianism Cyber-utopianism or web-utopianism or digital utopianism or utopian internet is a subcategory of technological utopianism and the belief that online communication helps bring about a more decentralized, democratic, and libertarian society. The de ...

on the Web in its beginnings and to utopia in general. Non-profit hospitality exchange services have offered scientists access to their anonymized data for publication of insights to the benefit of humanity. Before becoming for-profit, CouchSurfing offered four research teams access to its

social network A social network is a social structure made up of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), sets of dyadic ties, and other social interactions between actors. The social network perspective provides a set of methods for an ...

ing data. In 2015, non-profit hospitality exchange services Bewelcome and

Warm Showers Warm Showers (WS) is a non-profit hospitality exchange service for people engaging in bicycle touring. The platform is a gift economy — hosts are not supposed to charge for lodging and are not bound. The legal form is a Colorado 501(c)(3) nonp ...

also provided their data for public research. The biggest HospEx platform in 2012, ''"CouchSurfing appears to fulfil the original utopian promise of the Internet to unite strangers across geographical and cultural divides and to form a global community"'' CouchSurfing used utopian rhetoric of "better world," "sharing cultures," and of much better access to global flows and networks of all sorts. It was featured as a means to achieve a cosmopolitan utopia. Commodification of CouchSurfing terminated ''"the existence of a project run as a flourishing commons, a cyber-utopian dream come true; an example of genuine exchange outside and free from the dominant logic of capital, a space highlighting cultural instead of monetary values, understanding instead of commerce. This space still exists, but instead of outside, now within the market."'' After CouchSurfing became a for-profit corporation in 2011, some members urged others to join BeWelcome. Many

brand ambassador A brand ambassador (sometimes also called a corporate ambassador) is a person engaged by an organization or company to represent its brand in a positive light, helping to increase brand awareness and sales. The brand ambassador is meant to embod ...

s, who had become volunteers within CouchSurfing left to BeWelcome and other non-profit platforms because of the change in legal status and insufficient management transparency.

Notable social networking services and online marketplaces for homestay arrangement

References

External links

* {{Authority control Tourist accommodations Backpacking Hotel terminology