Social Capital and Cultural Capital of Akha Ethnic Group to Formulate the Strategies for Promoting Cultural Tourism

Abstract

The objectives of this article were to study the social and cultural capital of Akha ethnic group, and to formulate the strategies for promoting Akha's cultural tourism.  This study was qualitative research.  The research data were collected via in-depth interviews of 27 key-informants and were analyzed with content analysis. The results revealed that the social capital of Akha ethnic group comprised human capital, institution capital, and local wisdom capital.  As for their human capital, they had kinship relationships, and had people who were the core of living.  For their institution capital, they had the strong family institution, the village as the governing institution, and animism as the religious institution.  For their local wisdom capital, they had community local wisdom persons to impart the body of knowledge.  On the other hand, the cultural capital of Akha ethnic group comprised the tangible cultural capital and intangible cultural capital.  Their tangible cultural capital included their house building styles, their costumes, artifacts or statues, community-ground, and swings.  Their intangible cultural capital included agricultural rituals, beliefs in spirits, traditions, plays, and musical instruments. Social capital and cultural capital of the Akha ethnic group could be used to formulate the strategies for promoting cultural tourism such as tourism potential development strategies, preservation and participation which would create benefits from sustainable tourism for both the Akha ethnic group as the host, tourists, and other stakeholders.