The purpose of this study is to examine migration patterns of labor force by vocational education in traditional industry regions. Although previous studies of traditional industry mainly discussed innovation, many traditional industries continue to apply traditional techniques for production. The author makes temporal-spatial analyses of the apprenticeship and migration patterns of skilled artisans in the Wajima shikki industry. The analyses lead to the following results. Apprenticeship in the Wajima shikki industry has been changed qualitatively by the increase of production, during which people from outside central Wajima entered the shikki industry. Therefore, the main function of apprenticeship shifted from “inheritance” of skill to “spread”. Three migration patterns of artisans are extracted by the analysis of lifepaths. First, “stay” pattern includes inheritors who were born in central Wajima. The pattern reflects the basic function of apprenticeship before the growth of production. It preserves a spatial agglomeration of shikki firms in central Wajima. Second and third patterns include the artisans who were newcomers to the shikki industry, brought up with no connection to the industry. Among them, the artisans who were born outside central Wajima belong to the second pattern. It shows a “centripetal-centrifugal” pattern. Artisans who were born in central Wajima demonstrate the third “centrifugal” pattern. The two patterns contribute to the expansion of shikki firms' distribution. © 1995, The Association of Japanese Geographers. All rights reserved.
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