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The purpose of this paper is to discuss the touristic classification of the developing practices in the northern districts of Marseille (France).

This paper is based on participant observation and semi-structured interviews, sometimes conducted within a sightseeing tour situation and loosely inspired by the “guided tours” technique.

The paper shows there is currently no definition of tourism in itself, just tourism for itself. Hence, the touristic classification of the implementations in Marseille’s northern districts is relative, relational and transversal.

The paper does not exhaust (far from it) the subject of the touristic classification of the implementations in Marseille or, a fortiori, the debate on what “makes” tourism. This paper is simply one link in the historical chain of Marseille’s northern districts, which are (or are not) currently being invented as a tourist destination.

This research has led to sustained and continuous exchanges since 2012 with the Hôtel du Nord cooperative, which discusses and integrates the academic point of view into its practice, most notably to advance in its relationship with the touristic classification of the practices it deploys.

The contribution made by this paper to the debate on the classification of contemporary tourism is based on a domain that is as yet relatively unexplored from this point of view and which has benefited from the close investigation of practices that the author’s embedded-researcher position has allowed.