2009 Volume 2009 Issue 9 Pages 9_1-9_22
Island of Yunnu, more commonly called Yoron, is one of the Amami Islands, located about 23 km north of the main island of Okinawa. In December 1953, the Amami Islands were separated from Okinawa, then under U.S. control, and incorporated into Kagoshima Prefecture of Japan. Yoron became the southernmost island of Japan, where young Japanese began to visit from the late 1960s. They enjoyed a vacation by the beautiful blue sea with coral reefs, and the warm hospitality of the islanders. Yoron was famed as the domestic “Paradise” in the subtropics in Japan.
However, following the reversion of Okinawa to Japanese control and the re-establishment of Okinawa Prefecture in 1972, Okinawa became the primary destination for domestic tourists looking for the subtropical resorts. The foundations for the tourism development in Okinawa had already been laid by the U.S. military government after the separation of the Amami Islands. In 1970s, the rapid growth of tourism in Okinawa also saw an initial upsurge in tourists visiting Yoron, but as more attractive tourists sites with better facilities were developed in Okinawa, Yoron lost its appeal as a “Paradise” resort by degrees.
These days see tourism on Yoron go from bad to worse, as the small island of Yoron is unable to offer something distinctive and different compared with Okinawa. The tourist gaze at Yoron was almost absorbed into the more general gaze at Okinawa. As Okinawa developed, Yoron had to try to strike out on its own within the larger framework of tourism centered on the Okinawa area rather than within the framework on the Amami area or Kagoshima Prefecture. Its resultant position has made it structurally vulnerable among other Okinawan tourist sites, and brought about the stagnation of Yoron tourism.
This essay is an ethnographic study that focuses upon the development and decline process and the structural positionality of tourism on Island of Yunnu, a small “Paradise” resort island of the Amami Islands, in the context of Okinawan tourist area.
