Trips, Food, Language: The Tourist Gaze in Janice Y. K. Lee's The Expatriates

旅遊、食物、語言：李倫京《旅外者》中的觀光凝視

10.6184/TKR.202112_52(1).0004

Pi-li Hsiao

the tourist gaze ； the local gaze ； Janice Y. K. Lee ； The Expatriates ； 觀光凝視 ； 在地凝視 ； 李倫京 ； 《旅外者》

Tamkang Review

52卷1期（2021 / 12 / 01）

69 - 97

英文

COVID-19 has adversely affected the global travel industry and altered the landscapes of popular tourist attractions. Social unrest can exacerbate the situation. Apart from the pandemic, Hong Kong witnessed a marked deterioration due to continuing pro-democracy demonstrations. With the widespread use of technology and media, which often change worldwide imagination about a place overnight, an acclaimed tourist attraction can lose its appeal in no time. This phenomenon raises questions about how tourists imagine and gaze at their travel destinations. To what extent do preconceived images influence tourists? Do tourists travel to experience new things or to reinforce the pre-existing stereotypes about their destinations? Will their contact with local people challenge the stereotypes? Or will it perpetuate them? The paper attempts to address these and other related questions through a close reading of Janice Y. K. Lee's Hong Kong based novel The Expatriates. Adopting tourism scholars John Urry and Jonas Larsen's theory of the ＂tourist gaze＂ and further adaptations and appropriations made by other scholars, the paper analyzes how the tourist gaze is employed by Lee's American expats in terms of trips, food, and language. In the novel, it is found, otherness in the traveling eye contributes to the construction of Americanness. The paper also examines the relationship between the local gaze and cross-cultural understanding. The local gaze, meaning local people's responses to the tourist gaze, can be both positive and negative. Confronted with the local gaze, Lee's three women protagonists become more aware of their limitations as tourists and achieve varying degrees of familiarity with the local culture, though each of them progresses at her own pace. The tourist gaze entails a tourist's expectation to witness the ＂authenticity＂ of her travel destination. However, we can see there exists no such authenticity at all. When the tourist gaze and the local gaze are interwoven, more images about a place are created.

新冠肺炎重創全球旅遊業並改變著名景點的風貌，倘若加上社會不安，情勢將更加嚴峻。新冠疫情之外，持續的民主抗爭嚴重影響香港旅遊。無所不在的科技與媒體一夜之間改變世人對地方的想像，旅遊勝地也因而在瞬間黯然失色，這個現象引導我們關注旅遊者如何想像及凝視其旅遊目的地。先入為主的印象如何影響旅遊者？旅遊究竟是為了體驗新鮮事物或是印證對目的地的既有印象？與在地人接觸後，旅遊者會改變或延續其刻板印象？本文透過閱讀李倫京以香港為背景的小說《旅外者》來回答這些問題。首先援用旅遊學者厄里及拉森的觀光凝視理論與相關學者的批判與補充，由旅遊、語言、及食物三方面分析小說中的觀光凝視。我們發現小說中描述的美國性是經由旅遊者眼中的他者建構而成。其次，本文檢視在地凝視以及跨文化理解之間的關係。在地凝視乃在地人對觀光凝視的回應，影響所及良窳互見。小說中的三位女主角各自以不同的步調熟悉在地文化，並且理解本身作為旅遊者的限制。旅遊者期盼親眼目睹旅遊目的地的真實面貌，然而真實道地並不存在，更多地方形象將隨著觀光凝視與在地凝視的交會而產生。

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