662 Selling the National Story: Destination Marketing and the Olympic Games Opening Ceremony Dr Leanne White* Senior Lecturer in Marketing School of International Business Victoria University PO Box 14428 Melbourne VIC 8001 Australia Email: LeanneK.White@vu.edu.au Abstract This working paper will undertake a close analysis of eight of the most recent Olympic Games Opening Ceremonies. The ceremonies examined are: Moscow (1980), Los Angeles (1984), Seoul (1988), Barcelona (1992), Atlanta (1996), Sydney (2000), Athens (2004) and Beijing (2008). The paper will also discuss some of the images that might be presented at the forthcoming Olympic Opening Ceremony on July 27, 2012 when the eyes of the world will be firmly focused on London. The Opening Ceremony of an Olympic Games is an incredibly rich text to examine. The focus of this paper is on the selection of particular stories, people and images by ceremony organisers to tell (and sell) the national story of the host country. The images are meticulously chosen and almost always generate significant media coverage, community discussion and occasionally, robust debate. The stories and images can often say much about the nation-state that has won the rights to stage what is arguably the most highly coveted global event – the Olympic Games. Key words: Olympic Games, Opening Ceremony, National Identity, Nationalism, Stories, Images. Introduction The Olympic Games is regarded as the ‘spectacle par excellence’ and the Opening Ceremony is often considered the most important event in the Games telecast. In an Olympic Opening Ceremony, central prominence is deliberately given to the national identity of the host country (Larson and Park, 1993). Founder of the modern Olympic movement, Pierre de Coubertin, recognised that it was through the enactment of the ceremonies that Olympic ideals were performed and communicated. As James Larson and Heung-Soo Park note, Olympic ceremonies are designed to highlight “nationalistic symbolism”, and the “pursuit of national pride and national prestige through Olympic success has become a hallmark of the modern Games” (Larson and Park, 1993: 35). An Olympic Games Opening Ceremony is one of the world’s great media events.