Thanks to Dr. Michael Dylan Foster at the University of California – Davis, the FCTS had a valuable opportunity to learn the role of intangible heritages in sustainable tourism.  The FCTS members met Dr. Foster over Zoom on October 12, 2021, and briefly introduced each member’s research interests and talked about their links to sustainability.

Dr. Foster is a professor of Japanese and chair of the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the UC-Davis. As a renowned researcher and author of Japanese folklore, he has published more than five books and a number of articles regarding Japanese cultures, literature, and intangible heritages.  His expertise in yokai and UNESCO Intangible Heritage provides the FCTS members with insights on examining sustainability of tourism from multiple views.

We all enjoyed learning about a diverse range of research areas that link to tourism in a wide variety of manners.  The connections between tourism and heritages, economics, transportation, community development, applied linguistics and cross-cultural communication, public health, natural resource management, and visitor communication have become visible to the members.  Such connections are the essence of sustainable tourism.  We will continue to discuss sustainable tourism through seminars and meetings with Dr. Foster.

Thank you, Dr. Foster!