著者

神田 孝治

出版者

学術雑誌目次速報データベース由来

雑誌

人文地理 (ISSN:00187216)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.53, no.5, pp.430-451, 2001

被引用文献数

3 4

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This paper examines the development process of Nanki-Shirahama Spa Resort, located in southern Wakayama Prefecture in the modern period, in terms of its association with images of other places. In this paper, an attempt is made to examine the triple relationships of "tourism", "otherness", and the "spatiality of capitalism", current concepts stemming from the "cultural turn".<br>To understand the images of other places in tourism space, such images are characterized into two dimensions and their mutual relationship is analyzed. In the first dimension, the image of the tourism space as an "other" place contrasts with images of ordinary and familiar places. In the second dimension, images of geographically remote "other" places are evoked in the imagination. Thus, tourism space becomes the site of "other" encounters. Since the modern period is an age of globalism and nationalism, images which imply a connection to distant "other" places tend to evoke desires and idyllic thoughts and contribute to national identity, and are thus more suitable as the core image of tourism space than one which merely contrasts with ordinary images. In addition, liminal place-myths are more easily formed by this core ima ge through combining a set of images in tourism space.<br>This study aims to further understand the relationship between images of other places and the material creation of tourism space. H. Lefebvre's work (1991) on the outline of space recognition in "The production of space" was therefore consulted. In short, the production of tourism space is treated as a triple dialectic of spatial practice, representation of space and space of representation. Using R. W. Butler's hypothesis (1980) of a tourist area cycle of evolution, three evolutionary stages of the modern tourism space are distinguished: exploration, involvement, and development. The relationship between the images of other places and the process of producing tourism space is considered for each stage.<br>In the Nara Period, the beginning of the exploration stage in this tourism space, Emperors visited Muro-no-onyu, which was called the Yusaki or Shirahama spa, and was counted among the three oldest Japanese hot springs after the modern term. Later, it became popular with spa and sightseeing guests from the Kishu clan in the Edo era. In the early modern period, because it could be reached by ship, explorer-type tourists came from the city. At that time, the spa, renowned for its therapeutic qualities, was called the Yusaki hot spring.<br>The involvement stage began in 1919, when the Shirahama Land Development Company built a resort. Created by Honda Seiroku, the father of the Japanese national park system, this development project was modeled after the German-created beach resort of Qingdao. The Shirahama Land Development Company utilised modern development techniques, such as digging hot springs, creating a road, cottage and park area, and constructing recreational facilities. The core "other" image of this tourism space was the whiteness of "Shira-ra-hama", a clean, white, sandy beach in Shirahama, because it contrasted with the dark images of cities caused by smoke and labor. This whiteness image evoked liminal place-myths, such as making love, curing the body and healing the mind by connecting with other whiteness images of a modern woman's skin and modern infrastructure. Because of these modern white images, many tourists experienced European and American geographical images, which evoked ideal modern culture or free love place-myths. However, these modern and occidental images also evoked images of the modernized city, the "ordinary" place, which is destructive to nature and the whiteness of the beach. Therefore, white and occidental images gradually became poor symbols of "other",