ABSTRACT
People travel to attend or partake in popular culture activities and events that express particular worldviews, lifestyles and identifications. Culture in general embodies an inexhaustible accumulation of expressive practices that can widely appeal to fans and tourists. Up until now, research on popular culture and tourism has destination and tourist/fan perspectives. The destination perspective focuses on concepts such as commoditization (MacCannell, 1973), staged performance and authenticity (Cohen, 1988; Xie, Osumare & Ibrahim, 2007); these deal with the extent to which a tourism experience is organized for visitors and to what degree it can be regarded as ‘genuine’. Other studies that originate in popular culture demonstrate how celebrities’ associations with places can influence tourists’ perceptions of the destinations (Lee, Scott & Kim, 2008). The area within which the majority of research has been focused is that of film tourism. This is where, according to Beeton’s (2010) review, development has moved from confirming the phenomenon and calculating tourist flows (Riley, Baker & Van Doren, 1998; Riley & Van Doren, 1992; Tooke & Baker, 1996), to focusing on more complex factors such as tourists’ motivations (Beeton, 2005; Riley & Van Doren, 1992) and the management of and impact on destinations (Mordue, 1999, 2001). Current research focuses on postmodern interpretations of concepts such as authenticity, hyperrealism and simulacra, which takes the discussion beyond simplified explanations of film as a marketer of places (Beeton, 2010). According to Baudrillard, hyperrealism means that the border between the simulated and the real is dissolved and that simulacra are simulated codes (substitutes for reality) that are communicated via consumption and the media (Baudrillard, 1994).
