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2020 Fiscal Year Annual Research Report

Uncovering the black-box of educational dark tourism: Comparative analysis of the mechanisms of packaging and perceiving of war narratives through war heritage sites between former enemies

Research Project

Project/Area Number 18H03462
Research InstitutionRitsumeikan Asia Pacific University

Principal Investigator

吉田 香織  立命館アジア太平洋大学, アジア太平洋学部, 教授 (00550386)

Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha) BUI ThanhHuong  立命館アジア太平洋大学, アジア太平洋学部, 准教授 (80711556)
YOUN SeungHo  立命館アジア太平洋大学, アジア太平洋学部, 准教授 (80804757)
DIMACHE ALEXANDRU  立命館アジア太平洋大学, アジア太平洋学部, 助教 (30870240)
Project Period (FY) 2018-04-01 – 2022-03-31
Keywordswar memory / educational tourism / memory studies / dark tourism / war heritage
Outline of Annual Research Achievements

Research achievements in the last three years focus mainly on follow-up interviews with people at war-related heritage sites and (educational) war-related tourism, contacting with research assistant to collect war-related site visitors' comments and educational tour materials, participating data analysis workshops, updating literature review chiefly on theoretical/conceptual framework for discussing data in Asian context, and presenting research outcomes both orally at conferences and in written publications. More specifically, we achieved the following activities: 1)follow-up interviews with war-related site tourism organizers (Okinawa, Vietnam), 2)follow-up interviews with a school teacher in Fukuoka initiating educational tour, 3)follow-up interviews with former volunteer guide in war-related educational tours in Okinawa, 4)conduct fieldwork and interviews in Ookunoshima, Hiroshima, as a dark tourism site, 5)contact with research assistant in the DMZ in Vietnam to collect guest book comments for analysis in the final year of the project, 6)participating online workshops for data analysis (coding for qualitative analysis), 7)comprehensive review of literature on memories studies and history on: Vietnam War veterans from Vietnam and the U.S., as well as complexities of interpreting the Battle of Okinawa among different generations for upcoming book projects, 8)presentations of the research outcomes at various international conferences and book chapters.

Current Status of Research Progress
Current Status of Research Progress

2: Research has progressed on the whole more than it was originally planned.

Reason

Our project is considered to have been going fine overall, based on the completion of the following activities: 1)follow-up interviews with war-related site tourism organizers, a school teacher organizing educational dark tour, and former volunteer guide in war-related educational tours, to fill in some missing pieces, 2)fieldwork to lead to further research potentials related dark tourism, 3)collecting guest book comments for analysis, assisted by data analysis workshops, 4)comprehensive review of literature to incorporate or rearrange to update data interpretation, 5)presentations of the research outcomes orally and in a written form. In addition, on-going writings include: 1)a manuscript titled "Social Representations in Battlefield Tourism for submission" for Annals of Tourism Research" by H.Bui, K.Yoshida, D.Weaver(co-author); 2)a manuscript titled "Dark tourism revisitation: Evidence from Vietnam War Heritage" for International Journal of Tourism Research by H.Bui, P.M. Ngo(co-author), K.Yoshida; 3)a manuscript titled "Visitor experiences at the site of the Vietnam War" for Tourism Geographies by H.Bui, P.M. Ngo(co-author), K.Yoshida.

Strategy for Future Research Activity

Our research approaches and direction, as well as our interpretations of the collected data, have been oriented in the (Western) concept of dark tourism. However, the results we have achieved so far indicate the need and potential of articulating a more appropriate approach or concept critical of dark tourism, in order to interpret and explain experiences of war-related tourism in Asian contexts. Therefore, we plan to (re)establish the interpretation of dark tourism and educational war tourism, by reinterpreting contents and interviews with relevant stakeholders at war-related tourism sites, and young generations' (school children) responses at the sites. We will also expand our perspective on educational war tourism, by examining how war memories among young generations are constructed along with various representations of wars they encounter, through collaborating closer to school teachers to collect more students' tour reports.

  • Research Products

    (10 results)

All 2022 2021

All Presentation (7 results) (of which Int'l Joint Research: 7 results) Book (3 results)

  • [Presentation] (Re)memorizing WWII across boundaries: An Analysis of Young Visitors of Japan’s Educational Tourism (shugaku ryoko) in Okinawa2022

    • Author(s)
      Kaori Yoshida
    • Organizer
      International Workshop on Development of Community Development and Sustainable Tourism Programs in Natural Heritage Sites at Ryukyu University
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] Narratives of WWII through female bodies in peripheries: the analysis of Japanese postwar fiction, the series of Himeyuri in the North2021

    • Author(s)
      Kaori Yoshida
    • Organizer
      EAJS2021: 16th International Conference of the European Association of Japanese Studies
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] Educational Tourism as a Narrative Space for Contested Memories of WWII: The Analysis of Young Visitors' Experience of War Heritage Sites in Okinawa2021

    • Author(s)
      Kaori Yoshida
    • Organizer
      WCAAS 2021 Annual Conference (WESTERN CONFERENCE OF THE ASSOCIATION FOR ASIAN STUDIES)
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] Educational Tourism in Japan (shugaku ryoko) as A Contact Zone for Rememoration of WWII2021

    • Author(s)
      Kaori Yoshida
    • Organizer
      Asia Pacific Conference 2021
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] From the politics of memory to the politics of tourism: contested interpretations at the Vietnam War's former DMZ battlefields2021

    • Author(s)
      Huong Thanh Bui
    • Organizer
      Asia Pacific Conference 2021
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] Reading (Dark) Heritage Sites: A Peircean Semiotic Methodology2021

    • Author(s)
      Alexandru DIMACHE
    • Organizer
      Asia Pacific Conference 2021
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Presentation] Psychological Reactions towards Negative-natured Historical Attractions in Post-colonial Society2021

    • Author(s)
      Seung Ho YOUN
    • Organizer
      Asia Pacific Conference 2021
    • Int'l Joint Research
  • [Book] Vietnam Tourism: Policies and Practices2022

    • Author(s)
      Huong T. Bui et al.
    • Total Pages
      224
    • Publisher
      CABI
    • ISBN
      1789242789
  • [Book] Chapter 2 (The history and evolution of Vietnam tourism) in Vietnam Tourism: Policies and Practices2022

    • Author(s)
      Huong T. Bui and He T. Bui
    • Total Pages
      16
    • Publisher
      CABI
    • ISBN
      1789242789
  • [Book] Chapter 9 (Dark tourism in the former Demilitarized Zone) in Vietnam Tourism: Policies and Practices2022

    • Author(s)
      Phuong M. Ngo , Huong T. Bui , Alexandru Dimache
    • Total Pages
      15
    • Publisher
      CABI
    • ISBN
      1789242789

URL: 

Published: 2023-12-25  

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