Language and Community-Based Tourism in Thailand: Use, Needs, Dependency, and Limitations

Abstract: Language and tourism are essentially interconnected by the cross-border movement of tourists and the resulting encounters of people who often speak different languages. These relationships, however, have not been explored very much in the context of community- based tourism (CBT), a kind of tourism that has the potential to enhance communities’ socioeconomic growth, language skills, and cultural heritage. This study explores local communities’ perceived English language needs and challenges for tourism purposes in Thailand’s second-tier provinces of Chiang Rai and Buriram. Informed by fieldwork observations, semi-structured, and focus-group interviews, the findings reveal four key issues: i) the limitations of host-guest interaction and communication, ii) dependency on tour guides, iii) communities’ current communicative English needs, and iv) language users’ sociocultural and linguistic identities. In the cross-cultural tourism encounter, English was needed by the communities desp

Object Details

• Location: Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Frankfurt am Main
• Extent: Online-Ressource
• Language: Englisch
• Notes: Veröffentlichungsversion ; begutachtet (peer reviewed) ; In: ASEAS - Austrian Journal of South-East Asian Studies ; 13 (2020) 1 ; 57-79

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (where): Mannheim
• (who): SSOAR, GESIS – Leibniz-Institut für Sozialwissenschaften e.V.
• (when): 2020
• Creator: Nomnian, Singhanat ; Trupp, Alexander ; Niyomthong, Wilawan ; Tangcharoensathaporn, Prakaimook ; Charoenkongka, Anan

Further information

• DOI: 10.14764/10.ASEAS-0029
• URN: urn:nbn:de:101:1-2021101213093966225947
• Rights: Open Access; Der Zugriff auf das Objekt ist unbeschränkt möglich.
• Last update: 15.08.2025, 7:24 AM CEST