Tourists’ Embodied Metaphors in Lifestyle Cultural Space

Lifestyle Cultural Space as a Tourism Attraction

Lifestyle cultural space has a unique lifestyle emphasis and is strongly embedded in local communities. Creating participatory production and providing authentic cultural experiences are challenges for traditional cultural places (Douglass, 2016). Tourism spaces provide an alternative lifestyle experience (Nelson et al., 2021). When embedded in the hospitality industry, cultural spaces extend the appeal by attracting tourists in addition to locals. The teahouses in Chengdu are typical case-in-point hospitality, with any traditional practices being kept alive. Thus, they represent places not only for local residents’ daily leisure activities but also for tourists to observe, immerse themselves in, interact with, and understand the local culture. A Hong Kong-style tea café is a representation of Hong Kong’s everyday life (Chan, 2019). Similarly, teahouses seem to be regarded as microcosms of Chengdu (D. Wang, 2006).

The cultural space for drinking tea has long attracted academic attention. Tea mediates contradictions and formed a “communitas” of national identity in Victorian England, narrowing the psychological distance between people. The tea table offers shared rituals and creates communities by crossing boundaries between individuals (Fromer, 2008). In Japan, the simple aesthetics of teahouse architecture aim to support Zen-related spiritual fulfillment. Tea drinking helps visitors understand the spatial, temporal, and social relationships at their destination (Su & Zhang, 2022). However, the spatial function of tourist embodied cognition and enjoying the attractiveness of the cultural space of teahouses has not been explicitly articulated or academically explored. Teahouses in Chengdu serve as iconic gathering places for both locals and tourists to enjoy and experience local customs; for this reason, they deserve proper attention.

Therefore, we introduce the concept of “lifestyle cultural space” as a type of shared space between local residents and tourists. This space is embodied in physical settings in communities such as teahouses, coffee shops, bars, and even public baths. Most of them are highly representative of local lifestyle characteristics, with the initial purpose of catering to the leisure, cultural, and spiritual needs of local residents. They normally incorporate longstanding traditional customs and practices into spatial design and services, continuously keeping the culture alive and eventually evoking lived memories for visitors as well. These spaces serve as platforms for conserving and conveying diverse cultures and ways of life. An aggregated and systematic concept—that is, the lifestyle cultural space—is needed to better understand how tourists make sense of these spaces through their embodied cognition and perception.

Embodied Cognition and the Tourism Experience

Embodiment signifies how people grasp the world around them and make sense of it with their minds and bodies (Crouch, 2000). In Husserl’s work on the phenomenology of embodiment, embodied experience is described as “a communal nexus of meaningful situations” (Behnke, 2011). His work argues that the body is a lived centre of experience and that spatial directions and distances are directed along the paths of the senses (Behnke, 2011). In current cognitive science, the formative role that the environment plays in the development of cognitive processes is emphasized. Human cognition is embodied since it depends on the physical body (Farina, 2021; M. Wilson, 2002).

The spatial logic activated by bodily experience is advanced by cognitive psychology (Johnson & Lakoff, 2002). Spatial cognition is the study of mental representations of space, which can be imagined, thus representing spatial entities that humans have never directly experienced (Montello & Raubal, 2013). The meaning of spatiality can be expressed through a series of spatial properties, such as size, location, distance, direction, and connectivity. The study of spatial cognition has tended to focus on relatively high-level tasks, such as symbolic representation and interpretation (Montello & Raubal, 2013). The science of spatial cognition provides new paths for interpreting the correlation between the brain, body, and environment through physical behaviors and the spaces in which they exist.

Tourism destinations are also understood by tourists as embodied (Pons, 2003). Embodied cognition can be defined as cognitive reactions, attitudes, and behaviors through embodied experience. Tourists have many different sensory experiences, including tastes, sounds, spaces, touch, and temperatures, when traveling (Kock & Ringberg, 2019).

These studies have shown that the cognition activated by the body’s interaction with the world is worthy of further exploration. Research on tourist experiences has yet to systematically link cognition, perception, behavior, and space. Therefore, we aim to fill this gap by providing empirical evidence in the case of teahouses and by eliciting ideas into designing embodied, inspiring, and transformational tourist experiences.

Formation of Embodied Metaphors: Integration of Body and Space

Metaphors are the result of the development of embodied cognition and are defined as “understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another” and are “primarily a matter of thought and action” (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980, p. 5). From a cognitive view, metaphorical concepts can be represented not only through visual materials (Alousque, 2015) but also through language (Graf, 2011). Some particular metaphors in the tourism context have been singled out for discussion, such as “tourist bubble,” “island paradise,” “pilgrims,” and “vagabonds” (Adu-Ampong, 2016).

Metaphors also emerge from people’s cognition and their encounters with the world (Svanlund, 2007), affirming the influence of embodied experience on metaphors arising from spaces. Embodied metaphors are an important way to build links between the mind and body under the influence of an actual or virtual environment (X. Wang et al., 2018). While tourists gain novel, embodied experiences in local lifestyle places, the characteristics of the spaces and the experiences of tourists within them have yet to be examined from an embodied metaphorical perspective. The embodied experiences of humans are both psychological and physiological (R. A. Wilson & Foglia, 2021) and match well with the biosemiotics of embodied tourist teahouse experiences. This study applies the theory of embodied cognition to the interpretation of tourist photographs, together with reviews, to endow them with multiple senses and perceptions. Metaphors reveal meaning. Although touristic metaphors have been researched either explicitly or implicitly from different perspectives, many studies view them as “given without adequate analysis of the genesis and conditioning” (Adu-Ampong, 2016, p. 4). In addition, metaphors have received much attention, as tourism promotion discourse signifies so-called linguistic semiotics, leaving the interaction between the mind and physical setting under-researched (Metro-Roland, 2009).

In summary, there are a few gaps identified from reviewing the literature. First, the survival and thriving of lifestyle cultural spaces involve tourism, and there is a need to understand how tourists make meaning in such spaces. Second, embodiment is an essential element in the human–space interactions of such spaces, and research is needed on how such interactions take place at multiple levels. Third, there is a trend toward incorporating metaphors in tourist experiences on a cognitive level, and further applications in this direction are needed. Thus, this study serves as one of the first to interrogate the formation mechanism of embodied metaphors situated in tourists’ spatial and cultural interactions in lifestyle cultural spaces.

Research Design

This study adopts Sebeok and Danesi’s (2000) modeling system, which was developed based on Peirce’s semiotics, and a biological cognitive model to develop the theoretical framework. This approach has been identified as an effective and integrated semiotic method (Favareau, 2010). The sign is the signifier, and the object is what is signified. The interpretant helps understand the relation between the sign and the object, the three of which are bound together to form a triadic relation (Metro-Roland, 2009). This is shown in Figure 1.

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Figure 1.

Triangle Model of Semiotics.

We combined a biosemiotic modeling system and the theory of embodied cognition to interpret the formation of embodied behaviors and their environment, which is expected to provide a valuable reference for the design of tourist venues and the improvement of their service. In our study, the “signs” included online photographs and corresponding reviews. What the signs refer to are “objects,” which point to tourists’ cognizing of cultural lifestyle spaces. The interpretants include cultural perception or cognition, which helps to explain the relation between signs and objects. As a compelling explanatory theory, these three parts can shed more light on understanding the complex way that tourists cognize objects in an environment while interpreting meaning compared to other semiotic approaches in linguistics (Metro-Roland, 2009). Importantly, philosophical rigging underlines that this sign notion represents a comprehensive tool for factoring cultural context (Metro-Roland, 2009). In light of the nature of lifestyle cultural space in our study, this triangular model is deemed appropriate. Approaching the teahouses from a spatial concept perspective, we initially explore the visual construction of the scenes they shape through photographs. Based on this, we conducted multidimensional perceptual and metaphorical analysis by combining the corresponding reviews on the photos (to ensure that the reviews we used were sufficiently profound and detailed). The design of the study can help us explore tourists’ progressive experience of sensation, cultural perception, and embodied cognition, and further interpret tourists’ understanding of metaphoric meaning-making.

To determine the progressive understanding of tourists, we applied the theory of embodied cognition and extracted their experience in three progressive stages, each corresponding to one of three worlds. Specifically, we use the statements of Karl Popper’s first world (the sensory systems react to sense input), second world (a subjective inner world full of perception, memory, or imagination) and third world (field with cultural knowledge) of human experience (Sebeok & Danesi, 2000). With consecutive primary, secondary, and tertiary levels, this model provides a useful way of interpreting the human mind. These modeling systems were adopted to analyze both the object and interpretant of symbolic references and to construct a biological cognitive model of semiotics, ranging from Stage 1 to Stage 3, to identify the objects that the photographs referred to.

The innovative point of this paper is that the production mechanism of the embodied metaphor is determined through the analysis of the three stages mentioned above. The combination of the biosemiotic modeling system and the theory of embodied cognition in this paper helps to interpret the mental implications and semiotic representation of behavior and the environment through textual and visual material. Compared with other metaphor retrieval techniques, such as the Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET), which mainly relies on interviewing participants to reflect on their experience with deliberately chosen visual images (Jung et al., 2021), we argue that tourists’ online photos with accompanying reviews are more spontaneous and nonintrusive by nature. Together with one of the authors’ participatory notes for rigid triangulation, this systematic progressive approach is deemed to offer more insight into the embodied metaphors in the lifestyle cultural space.

Data Collection and Analysis

We collected tourist photographs and reviews from Dianping, a popular online platform offering local business searches, discount information, and user-generated reviews in mainland China. The six teahouses with the highest ratings, which conserve tea culture and represent the local lifestyle in Chengdu, were chosen. These teahouses offer a wide range of cultural activities, such as tea-making ceremonies, Sichuan opera, and acrobatic performances. Some of the traditional teahouses have heritage status and are located in historic buildings; the names and characteristics of these teahouses are detailed in the Appendix. Moreover, similar to many lifestyle cultural spaces worldwide, traditional teahouses in Chengdu face significant challenges in adapting to the rapidly changing economic landscape. However, they also serve as compelling case studies for reviving traditional culture within contemporary society. For instance, in Jiangsu, China, theaters host Kun opera performances, while in Turkey, mosques, churches, and public venues provide Meddah storytelling performances. These cultural heritages not only act as cultural hubs for local residents but also offer authentic and culturally appealing experiences for tourists.

Five hundred photographs of each teahouse (a total of 3000 photographs) taken by tourists were downloaded in reverse chronological order in September 2022. To facilitate the identification of tourists from other potential identities, such as locals, the authors filtered the Internet Protocol (IP) addresses and downloaded those originating outside the Sichuan Province. This was subsequently confirmed through a thorough examination of the content of the reviews. Notably, some tourists disclose their identity-related information while sharing their reviews. The initial screening was conducted to eliminate irrelevant or unclear photographs. The overall dataset contains 2997 tourist photographs. When sharing their photos about teahouses, most tourists attached reviews that ranged from long descriptive blogs to short commentaries. We tried to select comments with more details rather than simple ones to help tourists find more profound experiences and explore in depth the insights of comments to avoid personal variations (Jin et al., 2022). Finally, 563 comments corresponding to these photos were collected, and they were expected to assist in the interpretation of tourists’ perceptions or cognitions of the teahouses. It is important to note that the collected comments were written in Chinese. The first and second authors, who are proficient in Chinese culture and language, undertook the analysis and coding to ensure the precise understanding and interpretation of metaphors. All the authors translated the manuscript from Chinese to English, and all the authors cross-checked the translation to maintain reliability and consistency. Therefore, the process of metaphor extraction and translation is effective.

This study uses visual and discourse analysis approaches to examine tourists’ photographs and reviews. A visual analysis of the photographs was used to identify the visual elements that identified the teahouses as touristic places. When tourists appreciate pictures, they interpret, decode, and finally discover the culture contained within them (H. Wang, 2007). Many tourists choose to communicate their thoughts and ideas in writing to accompany and supplement their photographs (Sohrabi et al., 2020), and the user-generated content of online customer reviews can contribute to a deeper understanding of consumer perceptions (Lee & Bradlow, 2011). The discourse is an ensemble of ideas and concepts that give meaning to social and cultural phenomena (Hajer, 2006). The way ideas are expressed can be explained by discourse analysis (Zou et al., 2022), which can help researchers obtain a deep understanding of culture and society (Qian et al., 2018). In the present study, the application of discourse analysis to the examination of reviews sought to uncover the multisensory and metaphoric experiences of tourists in the given context.

The mixed use of discourse analysis and biosemiotics provides a way to extend discussion beyond surface meaning to reveal the symbolism of tourism places (Zou et al., 2022). In this study, we used methodological triangulation and data triangulation as a strategy to validate our findings. Methodological triangulation points to the semiotic analysis of online photographs, together with discourse analyses of reviews posted on social media. Data triangulation has the advantage of confirming the findings when using various sources (Lin et al., 2023). In addition to online photographs and reviews, we also resorted to participant observation as another data source to ensure the trustworthiness of this study. Participant observation was conducted by the first author to collect first-hand experiences, including photographs and observation notes, as a complement to the online materials. A field study was conducted in March and April 2022 in Chengdu. All six teahouses included in this study were visited in turn, and field observation notes were taken. First, the author entered a teahouse, ordered tea, and sat down on the bamboo chairs. Then, she observed the environment and the expressions, posture, and behavior of all people in the teahouse, including tourists, local residents, tea servers, and opera actors. Finally, she conversed informally with some of the tourists about their experience, thus “conceptualizing the broadest structural elements of the site” (Milazzo & Santos, 2022, p. 4). The Appendix (Figure 1) shows tea, the side of the roof, a Buddhist sculpture, carved doors, local residents, and a distant view of some selected teahouses. To ensure consistency, all the authors were involved in the coding process. Furthermore, three experts with relevant expertise in cultural tourism were invited to review the drafted categories and the photographs to ensure content validity.

Construction of a Visual Space

The 2997 photographs were sorted into 14 groups for visual analysis based on their subject matter. Next, two main categories and six subcategories of photographs with corresponding reviews were identified (Table 1). The two main categories are Environment and Persons. Signs 1 and 2 fell into the category of Environment, as they refer to the backdrop to capture the scenery and settings typical of tea culture and the natural and cultural environment of the teahouse.

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Table 1.

Categories of Photographs With Reviews in Six Teahouses.

Categorization of Online Data (Photographs; Reviews)
Environment	Sign 1	The scenery and furniture typical of tea culture in the photographs (1842, 61.40%; 280, 49.70%)
	Sign 2	The natural and cultural environment of the teahouse (204, 6.80%; 101, 17.90%)
Persons	Sign 3	The inclusive teahouse crowd, without differentiating tourists, residents, and other passersby (94, 3.10%; 26, 4.60%)
	Sign 4	Appearance and manner of local people in the photographs (689, 22.90%; 97, 17.20%)
	Sign 5	Appearance and manner of the tourists who take selfies (126, 4.20%; 52, 9.20%)
	Sign 6	Appearance and manner of people outside the teahouses in the photographs (42, 1.40%; 7, 1.20%)

The rest of the signs fall into the second category, “Person.” According to the shared photographs and field observations of the teahouses of Chengdu, the tea doctors demonstrated their skills in making covered-bowl tea, which is the expression of traditional tea culture that accompanies a tea service. The actors performed operas or acrobatics. The authentic gestures and appearance of local residents in teahouses impressed tourists as vivid carriers or expressions of tea culture.

Tourist photography is a natural approach to displaying the self, and places always become scenes for acting out (Bærenholdt et al., 2017). Many tourists enjoyed sitting or wandering around the teahouses, taking photographs of any place in which they were interested. Some photographs indicate that they also took great interest in making tea by themselves and wearing local folk costumes to take selfies.

We identified the subcategories of “the teahouse crowd" (Sign 3), the “appearance and manner of local people in the photographs” (Sign 4), the “appearance and manner of the tourists who take selfies” (Sign 5), and the “appearance and manner of people outside the teahouses in the photographs” (Sign 6).

Multisensory Experience and the “Lifestyle Cultural Space”

Based on the categories of the photographs and the construction of a visual space from the photographs, one of the authors collected all the reviews corresponding to the photographs (every tourist issued approximately four to six photographs with a long review with profound ideas, as stated above). All the authors engaged in a comprehensive discussion and subsequently generated a coding scheme that focused on identifying profound cultural implications within the reviews. Throughout the coding process, the authors considered the criteria of comprehensiveness, coherence, and fruitfulness. This approach ensured the inclusion of all relevant discursive elements found within the data while ensuring precision and distinctiveness (Jørgensen & Phillips, 2002). Consequently, the reviews were systematically coded based on their underlying meanings, resulting in the identification of 15 distinct themes, labelled R1 to R15 (see Table 2). This visual framework demonstrated the categorization of these themes into six overarching signs.

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Table 2.

The Primary Modeling System (PMS).

Signsof Photographs/Subcategories	Themes of Reviews andNumbers of Reviews in Each Theme	Objects of PMS	Embodied Behaviors of Tourists (Extracted From Multisensory Experiences) From PMS
Sign 1	R1. Pigeons on the roof, tea boiling on the old stove, slogans of the 1970s, as traveling to the past. (26) A world of tea, a pot of life, when tasting tea. (56) R2. Carved wooden windows, breathing freely. Bamboo furniture, getting in touch with nature. (48) R3. Tai Chi symbols on the woodcarvings of the stage, vital force circulating. (67) R4. Appreciating the landscape paintings, understanding the spring season. (10) R5. The signboard was carved with the phrase “Free and delighted.” Tea-related story wall. (73)	The tea’s flavor, tea steam from copper teapot, covered-bowl tea, and kitchen range. The rustic impression given by tables, chairs, doors and windows. The cultural design of the setting. The art design of the setting. The teahouse’s name and the appearance of the signboard, roof, and overhanging eaves.	Hear, observe, go back (to old time), taste, breath, touch.
Sign 2	R6. Breeze blowing through the forest, listening to the chanting in the temple, my heart is quiet. (35) R7. Looking into the distance, a bridge and flowing water, happy and free life. (22) R8. Wandering to experience the simplicity of the interior and the clear sky. This is Zen. (16) R9. See the outside scenery through a transparent window lattice, imagining the ever-changing scenery in four seasons. (26)	Elegantly designed surroundings, including temples. A small bridge overflowing stream. Pavilions and tearooms. Fresh air, luxuriant trees, and blooming flowers outside.	Touch (feel the breeze), hear, look into the distance, wander, see and observe.
Sign 3	R10. A miniature society. (26)	All the people in the teahouses.	Look and hear.
Sign 4	R11. Enjoy the performance of Sichuan Opera, the changing theatrical masks of actors symbolize emotional change, and excitement. Life is like a drama. Tea Doctors, the exaggerated movements of pouring tea imply grand plans or smooth sailing. (7) R12. The residents looked like they were from ancient time. (91)	Tea Doctor, opera actors, jugglers, and local residents in the teahouse.	Watch, hear, clap, taste, and observe.
Sign 5	R13. Making tea with friends is full of a sense of ritual. (22) R14. A new self, go back to the old times. (29)	Tourists.	Brew, pose, dress, and take selfie.
Sign 6	R15. The back garden of the city. (9)	People in more distant places.	Look into the distance.

We further analyzed embodied experience with metaphors in teahouses with reviews. In teahouses, tourists have multisensory experiences through their senses of vision, hearing, taste, smell, and touch; these experiences are further categorized into six kinds of lifestyle cultural spaces. In addition, their embodied physical and mental behaviors interact with the setting and the locals. The three progressive steps of the embodied experience of tourists in teahouses are as follows.

Formation mechanism of tourists’ embodied metaphors (based on the tertiary modeling system [TMS])

Lifestyle cultural space contains rich embodied activities and metaphorical cognition. Hence, we move on to the third step, which is the extraction of “embodied metaphors.” In this step, embodied metaphors are gained by tourists in the teahouses through embodied cognition. The embodied metaphor is a high-order, abstract mental representation based on bodily states (Wang et al., 2018). The deduction of the Tertiary Modeling System (TMS) means making high-level abstractions from the symbolism of semiology, indicating “World 3” of human experience (Sebeok & Danesi, 2000), signifying that order enters the individual’s life to generate knowledge. The TMS provides a way to explore meta-symbolism from phenomenon to metaphor, which centers on the similarity between two items, including cultural insights. Embodied cognition theory posits that human bodies interact profoundly with environments where their cognitions are deeply rooted (M. Wilson, 2002); thus, the embodied mind is represented (Lachaud, 2013).

Based on the principles of TMS and embodied cognition, we consider how behaviors interact with spaces in four steps. First, information on behaviors and the six elements of lifestyle cultural space were obtained from the PMS and SMS. Second, the key points were extracted and combined. For instance, “sight of old stoves activates history space” was the result of such processing.

Third, we confirmed a broader mechanism of the interaction, which moves beyond the restrictions of tea-serving hospitalities. For the same example, “Sight remind history” (see R1 in Table 3 from Column 2) was obtained.

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Table 3.

The Specific Embodied Metaphors for Tourism and Hospitality.

Signsof Photographs/Subcategories	The Formation of Metaphors Towards Embodied Cognition		Objects(Representative Embodied Metaphors) of TMS
	High Extraction of the Representative Interactions Between Embodied Behaviors and Spaces	Cultural Forces
Sign 1	R1 Sight reminds history. Expand the space of imagination from the taste. R2 Observing and breathing extend the experience to a far space (an imagined second home or a hometown in memory). R3 Stimulation of local cultural symbols leads to imaginary space. R4 Sight inspires imaginary travel to an extended space. R5 Sight of words inspires moving to an imaginary space.	Traditional culture (including tea culture) and customs. Traditional culture and customs. Religious beliefs. Artistic aesthetics. Tea culture and religious beliefs.	To travel back in time. A rich life is like a pot of tea. To interlink the human and the universe with a healthy body and be open-minded. The symbols imply longevity, energetic life with vitality. Stimulated imagination to the landscape in the painting, free movement of the mind. The words imply the comfortable and free state of Buddhism.
Sign 2	R6 Going into an inner world when experiencing nature or hearing a special voice. R7 Looking into the distant space arouses cultural insight. R8 Observing a space with philosophical musings. R9 Crossing the “line,” imagining a changing landscape.	Religious beliefs.	The inner world is like a Buddhist realm with the help of nature. To appreciate a distant landscape, or a rural place, having a happy life like flowing water. The simple view of life with Zen at the observation of a quiet space. The inside space is stable, while the landscape outside is changing.
		Artistic aesthetics and life philosophy.
		Religious beliefs.
		Artistic aesthetics and life philosophy.
Sign 3	R10 The behavior of “contracting the space” in mind.	Life philosophy.	To think of the teahouse as a miniature society.
Sign 4	R11 Entering the stage of performance, representing an embodied space. R12 Recalling a historical space at the sight of local residents.	Tea culture.	To go to grand plans, long and happy life (representing a respectful social structure through the spatial orientation of performative behaviors). To miss the old times.
		Life philosophy.
Sign 5	R13 Enjoying a common tea art show with friends. R14 Taking a selfie leads to an imaginary space.	Tea culture.	To have a close friendship (representing a close social structure through the spatial orientation of tea art behaviors). New self-identification in the teahouse.
		Internet pop culture and culture identity.
Sign 6	R15 Broadening the role of a place in the mind.	City culture.	To think of the teahouse as the back garden of the city.

Finally, we cannot ignore the power of culture. The TMS argues that the shaping of meta-symbols is related to cultural traces (Sebeok & Danesi, 2000). For instance, in the process of connecting behavior and space, some photographs and reviews have suggested that tourists be stimulated by the Buddhist phrase “free and delighted” (see Table 2) and that they then “stepped" into the free world of Buddhism. Similar situations occurred when Daoism, other religious beliefs, tea culture, or other culture or customs, were present in the tourists’ minds. Thus, it is necessary to add cultural forces (obtained from SMSs), which provide a great impetus for the formation of embodied metaphors.

With the above four steps, the formation mechanism of embodied metaphors in a lifestyle cultural space is shown in Figure 2.

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Figure 2.

Formation Mechanism of Embodied Metaphors.

Embodied Metaphors

From the TMS, we obtain a series of embodied metaphors, as summarized in Table 3. For example, in Sign 1, there is the metaphor “Interlink the human and the universe” (R2). Some photographs demonstrated tourists’ concentration on the spatial design of the teahouses. With airy rooms, customers can enjoy fresh air (implying health) through hollow windows and then follow the path of nature. These metaphors illuminate the cultural advertising and interior design of tourism destinations. Seasonal changes have been consistently associated with aesthetic experiences within the Chinese cultural context (Zheng et al., 2024). In Sign 2, the metaphor “imaginary four seasons through windows” (R9) implies a changing world outside the window when tourists are eating in restaurants or staying in hotel rooms. The window is a boundary for separating tourists from the outside space, but it is also a tool for broadening tourists’ visions.

In Sign 3, the metaphor of “a miniature society” represents all aspects of human life and originates from local society. In Sign 4, good desires for a long and happy life were implied when tourists photographed Tea Doctors performing tea art with sunlight coming through open eaves shining on the face or body, reflecting people’s values. In Sign 5, taking a selfie while making tea is a performance of self for tourists, leading to the metaphor “new self-role” from the perspective of tourists. Tourists’ selfie-taking is viewed as a “stylized performing and producing/consuming visual culture of the self” (Dinhopl & Gretzel, 2016, p. 126). In Sign 6, “the back garden of the city” is a metaphor for a teahouse as a lifestyle cultural space and shows its influence in the city of Chengdu, implying that they are deeply connected with its community.

Discussion

Using Sebeok and Danesi’s modeling system and the theory of embodied cognition, this study presents a progressive understanding of the formation of metaphors in the teahouses of Chengdu. We used 3000 online photographs of the teahouses of Chengdu taken and shared by tourists, together with 563 reviews corresponding to these photographs, and participatory observation notes, to explore how hospitality practices construct a lifestyle cultural space to improve tourists’ embodied experience. We further extended the characteristics of lifestyle cultural spaces in a tourism context, as these spaces are a third place for local people, present a unique way of living locally, and are grounded in cultural traditions.

This paper argues that with the force of different cultures, when interactions occur in historical and imaginary spaces, expanded and contracting spaces, and distant and embodied spaces—which are full of characteristics of tradition and culture—embodied metaphors occur through vision, hearing, touch, smell, and movement. These multisensory metaphors reflect the embodied cognition of tourists and how tourists create meaning in relation to the environment, culture, and products they experience (Kock & Ringberg, 2019).

The aroma of tea and the tactile nature and vision of traditional furniture are important bodily experiences that help shape how tourists tap into the spaces of metaphoric mapping. For instance, historical spaces are evoked when tourists feel as though they “travel back in time” (a representative embodied metaphor from the TMS), which is congruent with Graf’s (2011) notion that time is a position in space. Unlike other commercial and leisure spaces, these spaces are dynamic and involve interactions between human minds and the environment. Tourism is characterized by place consumption, especially in a cultural setting (Yang et al., 2023). These findings resonate with Montello and Raubal’s (2013) assertion that cognition of and spatiality represent a fundamental component of human experience, spanning from low-level to high-level, explicit to implicit mental processing.

These findings strengthen the metaphorical and spiritual experience of tea drinking and confirm that tourists form spatial, temporal, and social relationships within teahouses as lifestyle cultural spaces (Su & Zhang, 2022). A mechanism is that, between the experiencers and spaces, through the power of cultural representation of a localized community lifestyle, abundant formation of metaphors is achieved; thus, the attractiveness of attaining “a better life” is created. We obtained highly abstract information on behaviors and spaces, such as “observation and breathing extend our experience to a far space (an imagined second home or a hometown in memory),” “stimulation of local cultural symbols,” and “crossing the line, imagining a changing landscape.” Our paper echoes and broadens Wapshott and Oliver’s (2011) notion that the production of space provides a range of multi-layered social meanings, strong lives, and creativity in a space.

Theoretical Implications

In theory, we advance the notion of lifestyle cultural spaces, conceptualizing that the production of such spaces necessitates the collaborative interaction of various actors driven by cultural forces. In comparison to deliberately constructed tourist attractions, lifestyle cultural spaces portraying unique and authentic local ways of living exert greater appeal to visitors. Different from some similar concepts—for example, liminal tourism space, which focuses on immigrants’ lifestyle change related to tourism and leisure (Nelson et al., 2021)—lifestyle cultural spaces focus on what tourists experience in a space shared with local residents and how they enjoy the active lifestyle rooted in the communities. Furthermore, deeper cultural implications about lifestyles in these spaces can be better explored within this frame, providing a new path for tourists to understand destinations.

Addressing a concern in tourism research pertaining to the purported lack of systematic analysis within metaphor-relevant studies and the assumption of arbitrary relationships (Adu-Ampong, 2016), this study represents an early scholarly endeavor within the tourism and hospitality literature to suggest a progressive formation mechanism for tourists’ embodied metaphors within lifestyle cultural spaces. The integration of biosemiotics and discourse analysis provides a methodological approach to extracting metaphors, escalating towards higher levels of abstract mental processing. Recognizing the progressive development of metaphorical cognition, this formation mechanism can function as a crucial framework, providing a lucid and effective structure for the metaphor research domain. Furthermore, this study incorporates considerations of spatiality and culture into metaphor formulation, factoring in the inherent interconnectivity of cultural and spatial elements. This extends previous metaphor-related research (e.g., Adu-Ampong, 2016; Sampaio et al., 2014), introducing spatial cognition as a promising research avenue. This study also responds to Metro-Roland’s (2009) assertion that tourism metaphor research should transcend the mere linguistic turn that often neglects physical environments. Furthermore, by introducing a comprehensive visual and discourse analysis of both non-textual and textual data (tourists’ photos and reviews), coupled with the inclusion of multisensory experiences, this study adds theoretical depth and breadth to previous metaphor research, which traditionally relies on a single source and single-layered investigations, thereby adequately acknowledging the complex nature of metaphoric cognition.

Practical Implications

Compared with those of popular places, the advantages of traditional teahouses in Chengdu include not only their profound cultural history but also lifestyle cultural spaces that are well designed and wonderful and that represent local art and distinctive services. First, local governments should encourage the preservation of local traditional heritage in the hospitality industry to stimulate tourists’ imaginary spaces and further engender empathy for the local lifestyle. The utilization of lifestyle cultural spaces is important for preserving local traditions and showcases for tourists. Such spaces should be incorporated into destination marketing efforts. Special events and local cultural activities can be organized in association with lifestyle cultural spaces to foster local interactions among tourists and a stronger community identity for local residents. Second, tourism and hospitality operators should contemplate the need for regular professional training to maintain the authenticity of art performances. Third, destination marketing organizations and hospitality entities should recognize the importance and implications of tourists’ embodied metaphors in formulating their marketing strategies for these cultural spaces; for example, destination branding may derive metaphorical expressions based on lived history and rich cultural ambiance and optimize design elements to enhance the appeal for tourists. Factors such as ambiance, aesthetics, and psychological and artistic design elements can be manipulated to create a conducive environment for tourists. Features such as clear views, open windows, and special furniture can foster feelings of relaxation and enhance connectivity with nature. The use of religious symbols and artwork can further invigorate space, triggering imaginative travel experiences. It is also suggested that spaces that allow tourists to partake in local societal experiences, including interactive performances, be established.

Limitations and Future Research

This study is not without limitations. The issue of over-commercialization of the lifestyle cultural space in the obscuring mist of tourism has not been examined. We also overlook the possibility that the tourism industry may have a different influence on lifestyle patterns across various historical and cultural backgrounds. This study examined only teahouses as a representative space of local culture and lifestyle. These findings may be related to the uniqueness of the Chengdu lifestyle and culture. Nonetheless, we believe that similar lifestyle cultural places, including coffee shops, bars, and organic theatre spaces, deserve ongoing academic attention in their own right, hopefully because of cross-cultural studies across various geographic regions. For future research endeavors, we propose extending the application of this biosemiotic modeling system to a wider array of varied spaces within diverse cultural contexts. Examples include public baths, interactive and performance venues, and culturally authentic restaurants. These spaces possess significant features of rich cultural content, attracting both local residents and tourists. Additionally, as suggested by Li et al. (2023), more techniques can be integrated to “let the photo talk,” and additional research methods, such as in-depth interviews, can be integrated to enhance the investigation of tourists’ embodied experiences and metaphorical cognition.