Cultural capital and its dependency impact on fishermen’s work in Malaysia: A case study of Kuala Terengganu’s fishing community

Cultural capital which includes values, norms and attitudes is crucial in understanding a fishing community’s particular responses to positions and situations pertaining to their work. Given that many elements of the Malaysian fishing community’s cultural capital are relatively neglected this study examined the cultural capital factors that influenced the work of a Kuala Terengganu’s fishing community, namely, the use of leisure time, fishermen’s cultural values, and the impact of those values on their work activities. Primary data were gathered from a questionnaire-based field study of 100 fishermen in northern Kuala Terengganu. The results showed four types of values influencing the fishermen’s use of leisure time, namely, hedonism, fitrah (naturalism), pragmatism and authoritarianism. With regard to the impact of these factors on the work ethic of the fishermen five categories of dependency areas were observed, namely, income, social stature, identity, appreciation and human capital. Overall, the fishermen demonstrated a positive work culture driven by a sense of commitment, a sense of authority and pragmatism. Their capacity building actions were geared to long term survival, preparedness and competiveness.