Conservation of Local Wisdom in Ban Huai Sib Bath Community, Wihan Daeng District, Saraburi Province

Abstract

This article, a part of the research entitled “Conservation of Local Wisdom in Ban Huai Sib Baht Community, Wihan Daeng District, Saraburi Province,” aims to study the general condition of history and local wisdom, knowledge from valuable local wisdom and create activities to inherit wisdom for youth by using local wisdom as a lifelong learning base. It is qualitative research in which the data collection was employed by in-depth interviewing key informants and focus group discussions. Data were analyzed by content analysis method.

The research has been found that: Firstly, Ban Huai Sib Baht Community has developed via history for a long time as evidence appearing about ethnicity in Saraburi province. It states that after Ayutthaya destroyed around 1767, the war caused people to move between the Thai-Laos group and became a land trade route between the Mekong River Basin and the Chao Phraya River Basin. Later, it was established as a multicultural community with the abundance of natural resources. The said area was therefore suitable as a residence for merchants and cattle (buffaloes) to deal with merchants in Bangkok. And also, the aforementioned occupations have been still inherited to the present.

Secondly, from the discovery, it has been found that the local wisdom of Ban Huai Sib Baht can be divided into 2 types: 1) knowledge-body of historical, art, cultural and traditional developments; 2) knowledge-body of wisdom with career and lifestyle that can be upgraded to be a source of academic and occupation-learning for people in the community.

Thirdly, the developed activities can be divided into 2 forms: 1) activities promoting occupation being suitable for general public; 2) activities to promote long-life learning skills being suitable for youngsters. The both forms are potential development by using learning resources in the community as a center for exchanging knowledge that cause good interactions between each other in the community.