Interpretation of Geoheritage for Geotourism – a Comparison of Chinese geoparks and National Parks in the United States

• Authors: Fang Ren , Louis Simonson , Zhixin Pan
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

This study presents an interpretation system model of geoheritage to facilitate the understanding of geoscience knowledge by the common lay person. Interpretation system construction is crucial to geoparks and is a shared value. The improvement of the effectiveness of geoheritage interpretation is still under exploration. Therefore, the interpretation systems of two global geoparks in China are outlined and compared with the interpretation system in Zion National Park in the United States. From lessons and experiences, this paper suggests utilizing geotourism as a complete contextual communication system, in which a geopark (source) delivers information about its unique cultural and natural values to target tourists (receivers) through tourism activities (channels). The communication effect of geotourism is monitored by feedback from tourists through the post-travel surveys or activities. We expect that this model will provide a better interpretation of geoheritage with a new perspective.

Keywords

EN

Geotourism; Geopark; Geoheritage; Interpretation System; Communication channels

• Publisher: Sciendo
• Journal: Czech Journal of Tourism
• Year: 2013
• Volume: 2
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 105-125

Dates

published

2013-12-01

online

2014-01-29

Contributors

author

Fang Ren

• Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Saint Louis University, St. Louis, MO, USA

author

Louis Simonson

• School of Geography and Planning, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China

author

Zhixin Pan

• School of Geography and Planning, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China

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Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/cjot-2013-0006