Socio-demographic analysis of festival entrepreneurs in South Africa

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to examine the socio-demographic differences between entrepreneurs at National Arts festivals in South Africa. Language, and specifically Afrikaans, English and African languages, was used as the dependent variable. The Klein Karoo National Arts Festival (KKNK) in Oudtshoorn and the Grahamstown National Arts Festival (GNAF) are the two largest arts festivals in South Africa. The research was conducted by means of a questionnaire survey (N=500). The data from KKNK and GNAF were combined and factor analyses were applied to determine the role and attributes of entrepreneurs. Cross-tabulation analyses were used to illustrate the comparison of language with socio-demographical variables (marital status, qualification, province, family business, personal attributes, business premises and resourcefulness) and the role and attributes of entrepreneurs. In addition, the association of language with independent variables was examined by means of one-way ANOVA for the three language groups. Findings suggest that there are significant differences in festival entrepreneurs from different cultures (languages), especially in terms of socio-demographic variables such as marital status, education, province, business and personal attributes (resourcefulness).