Paris offscreen: Chinese tourists in cinematic Paris

Abstract

This article examines from a European-Asian perspective the relationship between media representations and the tourist’s imagination. We use the case of Chinese tourists in Paris to investigate how these non-European tourists imagine Europe and how these imaginations are being realized, challenged and modified during concrete tourist experiences. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with tourists and field observations, this article shows how the Chinese tourist imagination of Europe is strongly influenced by popular representations from the media. More in particular, the Chinese tourist experience of Paris as it turns out is characterized by an ongoing negotiation between media-inspired fantasies and personal experiences of the ‘real’ Paris. As a result of this, the way the Chinese imagined Europe before their visit is reinforced, but also challenged. Chinese tourists tend to develop a hybrid perspective: they learn to re-appreciate Paris in its complexity while re-constituting their own cultural identity vis-a-vis the European Other.