Paper short abstract:

This paper investigates how war memories have been interpreted, publicized, and embedded in war-themed dark tourism, by examining school trips in Japan (shugaku ryoko). It analyzes guidebooks and interviews with tour agents and teachers, to reveal the narrativization of WWII for young generation.

Paper long abstract:

The seventieth anniversary of World War II has given people in many countries a great opportunity to re-think or re-organize the way in which the war has been (or should be) remembered. As many scholars have argued, collective memories of war have been articulated significantly through various materials and methods. This sort of mediated memory-making process is a contested and political site where what to remember or/and what to forget is constantly (re)formulated and negotiated.

In this context, along with the fact that those who experienced the war first-hand have been dramatically disappearing, various tourism operations, such as "dark tourism" (Lennon & Foley 2000), play an extremely important role in articulating collective memories of the war, especially among younger generations. In Japan, just like other countries, memories of World War II have been fading away; and therefore affected sites, such as Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Okinawa, began to put fairly intensive efforts to explore different means and approaches to pass down the war records and experiences. This process can be problematic, as it may inevitably result in historicizing the war from particular perspectives.

This paper thus investigates how war memories have been interpreted, publicized, and embedded in war-themed dark tourism, by examining the (dark) tours targeted at elementary school and junior and senior high school children in Japan, called shugaku ryoko. It analyzes several guidebooks and brochures for school trips, focusing on how the visit(s) to "dark" sites are introduced and traversed structurally in the entire package of school trips, which may significantly contribute to (re)forming certain narratives and interpretations regarding the previous war. It also examines interviews with travel agents who create/coordinate school trips and school teachers who have directed these trips, with regard to their strategies and challenges through their experiences. These data are interpreted, in relation to the recent political economy of Japan including public discussions and criticisms toward the governmental policies on the national security. Subsequently, the study will suggest potentials and challenges in balancing the responsibility to retain memories of the war while being open to domestic and international tourism in contemporary Japan.