Abstract
Many people in contemporary Japan face themselves with the question "Who am I?". One of the social values that should be respected in modern society is the individual's autonomy and following this tendency, quite ironically, the individuals constantly need to reaffirm their self-identity. An example of this tendency is the recent popularization of the word "jibun-sagashi" ("seeking the self"), which represents the conflict of individuals with regard to their self-identity.
The craving for self-identity induced people, and especially the young generation, to discover backpacking. Identity is formed in the process of differentiation from the Other, and the "adventurous drift," wherein one experiences various cultures for long periods of time, can be seen as a social practice that constructs identity. In the field of sociology of tourism, research on backpacking has showed repeatedly that one's identity can be transformed in the course of an adventurous experience in backpacking.
However, the environment in which backpacking exists undergoes crucial changes. As the flooding of the market with backpacker's manuals has proved, the adventure is being commodified and now bears the characteristics of mass tourism. This paper introduces a case study of Japanese backpackers traveling in Asia. It explores the various cultural and social meanings embedded in what has been continuously represented as an "adventurous travel", or backpacking, and analyzes the conditions under which this phenomenon is re-localized in contemporary society.
