Speaker
Description
“Traveling for concerts” has become a popular tourism trend in China (He & Fu, 2024). Besides attending performances, travellers would explore host cities. More audiences, especially celebrity fans, now travel to other cities for an event. This type of tourism, tied to specific events or media content, is not a new phenomenon. As early as the 1980s, the influence of films and TV dramas on tourism destinations was recognized, making “film tourism" a significant topic in tourism studies (Nakayama, 2021). Later, the impacts of novels (Reijnders, 2011; Belarmino, 2023), anime (Jang, 2020), sports competitions (McManus, 2020), and music festivals (Kinnunen & Honkanen, 2021) on tourism experiences was also acknowledged. To boost tourism, the Japanese government introduced contents tourism (Graburn & Yamamura, 2020), referring to travel inspired by popular culture, alongside similar concepts like events tourism (Getz, 2008).
These concepts are typically defined around specific events or destinations. However, as active participants in affective consumption, fans’ travel behaviours could be far more complex, especially when involving cross-city trips. For example, fans may collaborate with cafés near concert venues to set up (celebrity) concert-themed exhibitions, transforming the cafes into temporary “fandom attractions” which may be more appealing than real attractions. In this process, fans not only utilize urban spaces but also creatively reimagine them. This model is providing new momentum for tourism development and urban regeneration for major cities in the post-urbanization phase.
As China’s fan economy is thriving, the fandom activities are becoming increasingly diverse. While engaging with the cultural functions of cities, fans also contribute to their renewal. This phenomenon is difficult to be explained solely within the frameworks of content tourism or events tourism. Thus, this project conducts exploratory research aimed at providing an overview of fandom tourism. Using questionnaires and semi-structured interviews, the study investigates fans' experiences of traveling to another city for events related to their favourite celebrities. Through grounded theory analysis, the study develops a theoretical framework for fandom tourism.
From a behavioural perspective, this study found that fans’ travel plans are primarily centred on celebrity-related events. The timing and location of these events play a key role in shaping their other travel choices. Activities in fandom tourism could be divided into three categories based on their relevance: core, related, and other activities. Firstly, core activities are the events that drive fandom tourism, typically tied to major cultural and sports complexes. Related activities include collective, social, and ritualistic activities, which may overlap. Collective activities, commonly arranged by fan organizations or event hosts, occur in large public spaces near event venues. Social activities are a key part of the fan experience, creating a demand for social spaces. Ritualistic activities involve fans visiting celebrity-related locations and re-enacting the celebrities’ actions at those places. Related activities would interact with urban commercial areas, green spaces, and other public spaces. Fans may not only utilize existing spatial functions but also creatively repurpose these spaces. Other activities mainly involve visiting local attractions or socializing with non-fans. In these cases, urban spaces are utilized in their intended functions. Though fan-related behaviours may still occur, such as taking photos at landmarks with the celebrity’s poster.
In the "post-urbanization" phase, urban development faces transformation and spatial restructuring challenges. As a driver of urban optimization, cultural consumption is one of the central elements of the "beyond growth" framework. This study develops a framework to better understand fandom tourism and its impact on urban spaces. Fandom tourism theory may aid in optimizing public services, revitalizing urban spaces, and supporting the integration of cultural and tourism industries, while exploring modern travel behaviours and sustainable development.
References
Belarmino, A. (2023) ‘Application of theory to literary tourism: a comparison of parasocial interaction theory and co-creation theory’, JOURNAL OF HERITAGE TOURISM, 18(1), pp. 18–35.
Getz, D. (2008) ‘Event tourism: Definition, evolution, and research’, Tourism Management, 29(3), pp. 403–428.
Graburn, N. and Yamamura, T. (2020) ‘Contents tourism: background, context, and future INTRODUCTION’, JOURNAL OF TOURISM AND CULTURAL CHANGE, 18(1), pp. 1–11.
He, Y. and Fu, M. (2024) ‘Shanxi Taiyuan’s 2024 Concert Economy Boosts Consumption by 4.1 Billion Yuan—’Travel with the Concert’ Unlocks Consumer Potential’, Overseas Edition of People’s Daily, p. 07.
Jang, K. (2020) ‘Creating the sacred places of pop culture in the age of mobility: fan pilgrimages and authenticity through performance’, JOURNAL OF TOURISM AND CULTURAL CHANGE, 18(1), pp. 42–57.
Kinnunen, M. and Honkanen, A. (2021) ‘Frequent music festival attendance: festival fandom and career development’, INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EVENT AND FESTIVAL MANAGEMENT, 12(2), pp. 128–147.
McManus, J. (2020) ‘Football tourist trips: a new analytic for tourism studies’, ANNALS OF TOURISM RESEARCH, 84, p. 102985.
Nakayama, C. (2021) ‘Film-Induced Tourism Studies on Asia: A Systematic Literature Review’, TOURISM REVIEW INTERNATIONAL, 25(1), pp. 63–78.
Reijnders, S. (2011) ‘STALKING THE COUNT Dracula, Fandom and Tourism’, ANNALS OF TOURISM RESEARCH, 38(1), pp. 231–248.
| Keywords | fandom tourism; urban regeneration; tourism behavior; cultural consumption; China |
|---|---|
| Best Congress Paper Award | Yes |
