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Media representation of the UK as a destination for Japanese tourists

Popular culture and tourism

Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan

Representations and images of tourist destinations constructed by popular cultural forms of media such as films, television and literature play a significant role in influencing people’s holiday decision-making process. This article illustrates the significance of media representations of destinations based upon findings from the author’s survey of Japanese tourists to the UK and briefly examines popular images of the UK created in the film Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, the television series of Sherlock Holmes, and Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit stories, all of which were identified as influential in the survey. It suggests that the ways in which the UK is represented in those media works have implications for the ways in which Japanese tourists define the UK as a destination and the character of the British. Thus, popular cultural forms of the media can promote, confirm and reinforce particular images, views, and identities of destinations in a very powerful manner.

Key Words: destination images • international tourism • media representations • popular culture

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