She is a tourism geographer working in the areas of geohumanities and mobilities studies. Her work weaves together environmental perceptions, identity and bio-politics, and performance theories to consider the relations between travel motivation and experience. From this foundation, she has published widely on the concept of authenticity in tourism studies, and has contributed a series of chapters to edited volumes regarding tourism mobilities as well as landscape perspectives for tourism studies. Dr Rickly is a co-author of Tourism, Performance, and Place: A Geographic Perspective (Ashgate) and a co-editor of Event Mobilities: Politics, Place and Performance (Routledge) and Tourism and Leisure Mobilities: Politics, Work, and Play(Routledge). She earned her PhD in Geography from Indiana University.