Mess and method: Using ANT in tourism research

•Five ‘character traits’ of the ANT researcher are identified.•Each is discussed in relation to an account of an empirical case study.•Their contribution to determining research quality is assessed.

The use of actor-network thinking is increasingly evident in tourism research. ANT offers the researcher a practical, fieldwork-based orientation, emphasising detailed description of relationships between actors in practice. However, questions which arise for the researcher in using ANT are seldom confronted in the literature. This paper contributes to the growing ANT literature in tourism by identifying five ‘character traits’ relating to selection and use of method in ANT research. It uses an empirical case study to show how these traits are performative in the researcher’s ‘hinterland’ of methodological choices, providing theoretical and practical reflections for future researchers. It ends by considering how acknowledging these traits in the account can demonstrate adherence to accepted criteria for research quality.