Abstract
There has been a growing worldwide phenomenon that tourists visit a destination or country as a result of that place being featured or portrayed in popular cultural forms of the media (media of entertainment) such as film, television and literature, which are not directly concerned with tourism promotion or marketing. A growing number of media representations have increased travel to those places featured in the media as the result of tourism images fused with those of popular culture. This thesis integrates theories from social constructionism by suggesting that tourism, tourists including their motivation, and tourist destinations are all social and cultural constructions and attention should be paid to a range of culturally constructed attitudes and values and the culturally specific differences. This study adopts a case study of Japanese international tourism to the UK and investigates how and to what extent popular cultural forms of media, featuring the UK, have an effect on Japanese tourists. It considers what roles the popular cultural forms of media play in shaping Japanese tourists’ behaviour, in terms of their choice of the UK as a destination and of places to visit within the UK, drawing upon data obtained from a survey and personal interviews with Japanese tourists. The findings indicate that films, television programmes and literature featuring the UK play a vital role in increasing interest in travel to the UK. This study indicates that popular culture acts as visual, and sensory stimuli to British tourism, producing images, ideals, and identities of the UK and British people for Japanese tourists. It is concluded that popular culture’s greatest impacts on international tourism lie in its ability to create destination awareness, consciousness, and images leading to a stronger interest in the destination and actual travel to the destination.