Cultural Transformation: Shadow Puppetry for Coastal Resource Conservation

Abstract

This research study aimed to create shadow puppetry literary arts for coastal resource conservation in Bang Dee Community, Na Khon Si Thammarat Province. This research involves participatory action research (PAR), which is related to organizing workshops, creating shadow puppetry works by youth artists in Muang Khon, arranging performance stages to transform the arts in Bang Dee Community, Na Khon Si Thammarat, and fostering innovation in online social media platforms such as Facebook Fanpage, YouTube, and Tiktok. Ten shadow puppetry youth artists from Muang Khon took part in the participatory workshop. The research findings indicate that Maung Khon youth artists, through the creation of shadow puppetry, applied the concepts of dynamics and wisdom in coastal resource management of Bang Dee Community, Na Khon Si Thammarat Province. They focused on traditional small-scale fishing, the wisdom in coastal resource management, and the stories and beliefs of the grandparent generation in the community. Then, these ideas evolved into the literary arts of shadow puppetry, which included Bang Dee Love Stories, court poems, octameter poems, Khon traditional poems, and three-five-word poems. These are innovations launched via online social media, Facebook Fanpage, YouTube, and TikTok, and presented publicly to widely encourage people to conserve coastal resources.