Study On The Distribution Characteristics Of Inheritors And Its Influence On Intangible Cultural Heritage Tourism In Wuling Mountain Area

Inheritors of intangible cultural heritage cherish important mission of inheriting splendid ethnic culture,and assume crucial roles in developing intangible heritage tourism.Paying attention to the protection of intangible cultural heritage inheritors is not only beneficial to the inheritance and utilization of intangible cultural heritage,but also boosts the high-quality development of regional tourism.In Wuling Mountains area which serves as ethnic minority community,contiguous area of extreme poverty,ecological and cultural protection area and ecological functional area,intangible cultural heritage inheritors are huge in number,great in variety,and wide in distribution,and play key roles in the development of intangible cultural heritage tourism.Revolving around representative inheritors at national and provincial level in Wuling Mountains area,this paper sheds light on the distributional feature of intangible cultural heritage inheritors in terms of four aspects,including identification batch,project category,spatial distribution,and demographics(age,gender,ethnicity).By means of Delphi method,Likert scale and regression analysis,this paper reveals the influence of distributional feature of ICH inheritors on the development of ICH tourism in Wuling Mountains area,as well as proposes a series of suggestions in an effort to promote the development of ICH tourism from the perspective of protecting ICH inheritors.The study yields the following findings.(1)The distribution of intangible cultural heritage inheritors in Wuling Mountains area presents prominent disbalance: the age distribution is unbalanced,as the aging problem reaches a grievous extent;the gender distribution is unbalanced,as female inheritors are in extreme shortage;the spatial distribution is unbalanced,as inheritors are mostly distributed in Enshi Prefecture and Xiangxi Prefecture and scarcely distributed in other areas;the distribution gap between urban and rural areas is wide,as most inheritors are distributed in rural areas;the categorical distribution of intangible cultural heritage is unbalanced,as the main categories cover traditional music,drama,fine arts,techniques,etc.(2)The intangible cultural heritage tourism in Wuling Mountains area manifests itself with great momentum.Tourism products such as intangible cultural heritage tourism performing arts and cultural and creative products have been developed,which have not only won over numerous investors in tourism,but have also boosted employment and entrepreneurship of tourism,thereby inducing remarkable social and economic benefits.Be that as it may,such following problems still exist: inconspicuous product differentiation,lack of innovation,insufficient brand awareness,uneven distribution of intangible cultural heritage resources,unbalanced tourism development and unsound protection mechanism,etc.(3)The distributional feature of intangible cultural heritage inheritors in Wuling Mountains area exerts a significant impact on intangible cultural heritage tourism.On the whole,regional distribution and categorical distribution exert the utmost impact on intangible cultural heritage tourism,while gender distribution exerts the least impact.Specifically,prominent impact is witnessed in sustainable development of intangible cultural heritage tourism,the protection and utilization of tourism resources,while negligible impact is witnessed in the investment of intangible cultural heritage tourism projects and the benefits of tourism industry.On that account,the paper,from the perspective of intangible cultural heritage inheritors,proposes such following measures: fully displaying the role of representative inheritors and establishing brand awareness;attaching importance to developing rural intangible cultural heritage tourism by relying on rural intangible cultural heritage inheritors;cultivating young generations and encouraging innovation and originality;fostering female inheritors to boost rural revitalization;engaging in regional cooperation to achieve the sharing of intangible cultural heritage resources;protecting intellectual property rights and attaching importance to the protection of development authenticity of intangible cultural heritage tourism.Such efforts are dedicated to strengthening the protection of intangible cultural heritage inheritors in Wuling Mountains area and promoting the coordinated development of intangible cultural heritage tourism.