Cultural Traits Representing in Online Chinese Promotional Texts of China’s World Cultural Heritages

Authors: Yubo Geng, Lay Hoon Ang, Hazlina Binti Abdul Halim (Universiti Putra Malaysia, Malaysia)
Speakers: Yubo Geng
Strand: Language, Community, Ethnicity
Session Type: General Session

Abstract

World Cultural Heritages are monuments, groups of buildings, and sites nominated by UNESCO based on the definition in the 1972 World Heritage Convention. Till 2021 China possesses 38 World Cultural Heritages, taking Great Wall, Summer Palace as examples. As the quintessence of culture, the 38 heritages become the core tourist attractions in China. Besides, with an increasingly significant role of the Internet in promoting destinations, linguistic content covered in China’s World Cultural Heritages’ official websites and local government official websites directly influences their publicity. The paper aims to examine what aspects of China’s World Cultural Heritages are highlighted as main themes on the websites’ content in Chinese. The research aim is fulfilled through a content analysis of Chinese introductory texts from 30 China’s World Cultural Heritages’ available official websites and local government official websites. The results show that artifacts, social structures, and beliefs demonstrated by the 30 China’s World Cultural Heritages are the main online themes, which form the Chinese cultural traits and are conducive to the promotion of the destinations. The study would shed light on the role that online linguistic resources play in the promotion of China’s World Cultural Heritages. References Blain, C., Levy, S. E., & Ritchie, B. J. R. (2005). Destination branding: Insights and practices from destination management organizations. Journal of Travel Research, 43, 328–338. Cao, K., & Yang, Z. (2016). A Study of e-commerce adoption by tourism websites in China. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management, 5, 283–289. Convention concerning the protection of world cultural and natural heritage. (1972, November 21). UNESCO. http://whc.unesco.org/en/conventiontext/ Hallett, R. W., & Kaplan-Weinger, J. (2010). Official tourism websites: A discourse analysis perspective. Bristol: Channel View Publications. Krippendorff, K. (1980). Content Analysis: An introduction to its methodology, London: Sage. Palmer, A. (2005). The internet challenge for destination marketing organisations. In N. Morgan, A. Pritchard, & R. Pride (Eds.). Destination branding: Creating the unique destination preposition (pp. 128–140). Oxford: Elsevier. Shi-xu (2005). A cultural approach to discourse. England: Palgrave Macmillan. Zuliani, A. (2013). A journey to Portugal: The official tourist promotion of Turismo de Portugal. In E. Manca, & F. Bianchi (Eds.). Tourism and tourist promotion around the world: A linguistic and socio-cultural perspective (pp. 61–80). Lecce: Università del Salento.

Keywords: China, Content analysis, Cultural traits, Online tourism texts, World Cultural Heritages.