REPRESENTING THE "THAI" IN LOST IN THAILAND: ANALYSIS OF ITS ATTRACTION FOR CHINESE TOURISTS

Abstract

In this thesis, a study was made of the film “Lost in Thailand” to explore the relationship between “Lost in Thailand” and its shooting location –Thailand. There are two objectives included in this thesis. To identify scenes and subjects represent “Thai” and to analyze elements being highlighted in the movie that Chinese audiences find attractive. The theory of Intercultural Communication was applied to analyze how “Lost in Thailand” presents “Thai images” to the Chinese audience and how the “Thai images” shown in the movie attract Chinese people to travel to Thailand. In this research, the questionnaire method was used to conduct a survey of 103 Chinese Thailand-visiting tourists and 117 Thai audience members who had watched “Lost in Thailand”. Questionnaires were designed to investigate the overall satisfaction of the Chinese and Thai audiences with the movie, their acceptance of “Thai images”, as well as their views on the driving effect of this movie on Thai tourism. A rolling on-piece analysis of “Lost in Thailand” was done to select out scenes and subjects that represent the “Thai”. As a result, There are 14 significant scenes that were extracted out, And Thai images being highlighted in these scenes were also distributed into 7 categories: (1) Cityscape and tourist facilities (2)Third gender (3) Thai Massage and Spa (4) Thai Buddhism (5) Natural Scenery (6)Thai boxing and (7) Sex industry. Survey results show an overall satisfaction of the Chinese and Thai audience with “Lost in Thailand”. And findings as follow: In the survey of Chinese tourists, Chinese tourists’ evaluation for this film is 85.5%. “Cityscape and tourist facilities” “Natural Scenery” and “Thai Buddhism” are Top 3 for that both “the most impressive when Chinese audiences viewed the movie” and “give Chinese audiences an idea of travelling to Thailand”. Survey results of the Thai audience showed the Thai audience’s evaluation is 63.5%. “Cityscape and tourist facilities” and “Natural Scenery” this two “Thai Images” are considered as “the images that can give Chinese tourists an idea of what to explore when travelling to Thailand”