NotesFAQContact Us
Collection
Advanced
Search Tips
Back to results
ERIC Number: ED444776
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 1999-Jun
Pages: 27
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
What Is Social Capital? A Study of Interaction in a Rural Community. CRLRA Discussion Paper Series.
Falk, Ian; Kilpatrick, Sue
A case study in a rural Australian township sought to determine the nature of the interactive productivity between the local networks in a community. Participants were chosen based on recommendations of community members concerning to whom they turn for help, advice, or information. Community interactivity was recorded using interviews, tape-recorded community meetings and interactions, and personal diaries. Findings indicate that informal learning is an important factor in the formation of social capital and that there are two categories of resources upon which people draw as they interact with each other. The first is knowledge resources, which comprise the common knowledge base of community, personal, individual, and collective information. These include knowledge of the skills, knowledge, and affective attributes of other community members, and knowledge of the common physical resources of the community. The second is identity resources, which are the common understandings of personal, individual, and collective identities, categorized as social and civic identities. Formation of social capital depends on sufficient numbers of interactions in which members foster each others' learning by sharing knowledge resources, build each others' self-confidence or encourage positive identity shifts in each other, and exhibit trust. It was also found that microinteractive processes have the capacity to link with meso and macro social, civic, and economic outcomes. (Contains 64 references.) (TD)
Full text at Web site: http://www.crlra.utas.edu.au.
Publication Type: Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: Tasmania Univ., Launceston (Australia). Center for Research and Learning in Regional Australia.
Identifiers - Location: Australia
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A