The Status of Western Local Literature Reseach in 3 Decades หน้า253-304

Abstract

This article studies the status of western local literature research on both written and oral literature in eight provinces of western Thailand : Nakhon Pathom, Ratchaburi, Phetchaburi, Suphan Buri, Kanchanaburi, Samut Songkhram, Samut Sakhon, and Prachuap Khiri khan, from 1977 to 2008. The results show that there are three kinds of research on written literature : collecting manuscripts; transliterating local literature into modern Thai or comparative checking manuscripts or rewriting and publicizing, and analyzing them as literary work. On the contrary research on oral literature, which are mainly on folk tales and folk songs, can be divided into two kinds : collecting field data, and analyzing data. Most of the research on western local literature are on Thai-book manuscripts, which are written literature of both local Thai people and various ethnic people. A large number of research was done from 1977 to 1997, but the amount of research has dramatically decreased since then. This implies that people's interest in local culture studies has declined.