The Jews in Hollywood: Altering Image through Religious Movies

This article discusses the altering image of American Jews in Hollywood movies. Coming to America during the great migration,  mostly from Eastern Europe, this Azkenazic Jews then contributed to the building and transformation of the Hollywood movies as a world icon.  Though quite dominant, Jews are quite careful in this industry. Anti-Semitism, the World War and the Great Depression are some of the things that make Jews uncomfortable about being in the spotlight or talking about their identity among the Christian audience of the movies. However, the condition changed after the Second World War and the civil rights movement in the 1960s. Jews and Judaism later appeared in various representations, which does not only change their image in Hollywood, but also the acceptance of American society broadly. Focusing on the movie, Ben Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1959) as the object of research, the study explores how Jewish people represent themselves through films produced, including the negotiations and changes made as part of the American Jews. Using the theory of Stuart Hall’s Politics of Representation and Critical Discourse Analysis from Fairclough and Leuween as an approach, this work focuses on the analysis of text and images as a sign that represents the Jews and Judaism in the movie. Related to movie as a media construction, the filmmakers are able to reconstruct Jews in different image. Through the movie, the represented Jews are found to have conveyed various messages to the audience about their cultural and religious identity

Jurnal Musawa: Solusi Dan Tantangan Akademis Dalam Studi Gender Di Perguruan Tinggi Islam

Permasalah Gender adalah gejala sosial yang sangat dinamis. Paradigma berfikir dan meneliti menyangkut proses tindakan ditunjukkan oleh lingkungan akademik UIN Sunan Kalijaga Yogyakarta dalam mendirikan Jurnal musawa. Hal ini guna kritik pada kajian gender secara akademis. Sejauh paradigma Gender dan HAM   dalam Kajian Islam, Sosial dan Sains menjelaskan peran Jurnal Musawa pada kanca akademis. Fungsi dan peran Jurnal Musawa menjelaskan secara elegan proses studi gender pada kalangan akademis baik praktis dan teoritis. Hal ini menjelaskan perubahan-perubahan pemikiran pada tataran filosofis memahami studi gender di perguruan tinggi. Jurnal musawa membawa wacana tersebut dalam perang kritik serta argumentasi. Hal ini mencerminkan adanya perkembangan pemikiran akademis dalam studi gender di Perguruan tinggi. Pola akademis ini memberikan ruang besar dalam Studi gender sebagai Lembaga pembelajaran perempuan di Pusat Studi Wanita(PSW) UIN Sunan Kalijaga.  [Gender issue is very dynamic social problem. The paradigm study gender concerns to any process of showing UIN Sunan Kalijaga Yogyakarta in publishing Musawa journals. The habit talks for criticism on academic gender studies. As far as the Gender and Human Rights paradigm in Islamic, Social and Scientific Studies explains Musawa Journal in academia. The challenge of the Musawa elegantly explains the process of gender studies to academics both practically and theoretically. It explains the philosophy changing in issues at the level of understanding gender studies in higher education. Musawa brings the discourse into a criticism and argumentation. The tradision reflects the development of academic thought in gender studies in tertiary institutions. The academic pattern provides a large space in gender studies as a Center for gender studies at Pusat Studi Wanita (PSW) UIN Sunan Kalijaga.

MUSLIMS IN THE AMERICAN CINEMA : MEDIA CONTESTATION AND POLITICS OF REPRESENTATION

Muslims have been existed in America since the pre-colonial period and increased along the Nation and formed the America as today. They came from many different places namely South Asia, Africa and Middle East. However, being minority among the other two of Abrahamic religions, Muslims have not been fully accepted , especially in media. Not only because of its small amount of the community and thus have less power among Christianity and Jews, but the discrimination and labeling toward this religion has led to phobia, a threat that do not only have a negative influence on certain ethnicity (Arabic) of Muslims in America but Islam as a whole. As Shaheen (2000:23) mentions, up to the year of 2000, there are more than 800 feature films and hundreds of television newscasts, documentaries, entertainment shows, ranging from animated cartoon to soap opera to movies of the week which construct Muslim and Arab in an hostile, negative, and militant way. This number was even multiply after the tragedy of 11 September 2009. The objective of this paper is to find out the cultural representation of Muslims in America, especially through the movie. How and why Hollywood depicts Muslims stereotypes on the screens which imply the negation of American society toward this religion as a whole. One of the interesting thing of those depictions is that the Islamic representation is mostly limited to Arabic ethnicity. As Israel and Palestine are conflicting and American interference in the Middle East are getting intense, the depiction of Islam in the movie is mostly related to ‘alien’, violent stranger and the terrorist of the world. The similar presentation from one film to another, which is indeed based on Western perception, has led to form certain ideology which is believed as a truth. In this sense, as a media of representation, film is no longer seen as narratives art per se which is supposed to be neutral, entertaining, and apolitical. Through this film ,it is seen an ideological system , an institution which compose conflicting class and interest which all competing for dominance. Ideological storage especially the Western perspective , cultural practice, historical perspectives or even such political interests are all mingled to contribute presenting Islam and Muslim in a different and limited way. When a particular construction of certain movies is followed by similar pattern of presentation , as the Hollywood intensively does toward the Muslims and any other minority groups, the impact is not only about the messages sent to the audience but also ideology and knowledge production

Bringing Local and Islamic Values in the English Teaching Method of UIN Sunan Kalijaga

Learning a foreign language can’t be seen as a ‘myopic isolated’ in which a certain knowledge only based on its certain field of study. A recent method of learning such as English as a second language has already focused on constructive theory, a multidisciplinary approach which combine some paradigms such as linguistic, psychology, and sociology2. In this sense, there are many aspects like socio-cultural involved, not only for the richness and comprehensive understanding of the teaching itself, but also for conducting an interesting method of English teaching –learning as a foreign language. Since IAIN changed into UIN Sunan Kalijaga, this campus has transformed into a an integrated-interconnected university which’s not only implied in its vision but also in its policy and curricula. This concept is like a multidisciplinary in which a graduate of UIN Sunan Kalijaga should be able to know and introduced both Islam and ‘secular’ knowledge. To support this policy, one of the mission is to obligate students getting at least 400 score of TOEFL for the under-graduate program before they graduate from their faculties. One of this implementation is a centralization of language teaching. Since 2008, this university has conducted a centralized Arabic and English in which all students from all faculties must take an English and Arabic class in the Centre for the Language, Culture and Religion (Pusat Bahasa, Budaya dan Agama – PBBA). The classes are held in the first year of their study, which’s supposed to be their basic English knowledge befor

Keterlibatan Siswa SMK dalam Pembelajaran Jarak Jauh dan Dukungan Akademik: Sudut Pandang Guru

Kurangnya keterlibatan siswa sering menjadi permasalahan dalam pembelajaran jarak jauh (PJJ). Dalam situasi tersebut, siswa membutuhkan adanya dukungan akademik. Penelitian ini bertujuan mengetahui bagaimana perspektif guru terkait keterlibatan siswa dalam PJJ serta melihat dukungan seperti apa yang diberikan guru kepada siswa dalam PJJ. Penelitian ini menggunakan pendekatan kualitatif. Subjek penelitian merupakan 23 guru SMK yang melaksanakan PJJ. Pengambilan data dilakukan menggunakan kuesioner yang berisi pertanyaan-pertanyaan terbuka mengenai pengalaman guru selama pelaksanaan PJJ. Data kemudian dianalisis menggunakan metode analisis tematik. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa guru melihat siswa kurang terlibat dalam PJJ. Selain itu, dalam PJJ ini diketahui bahwa guru masih dapat memberikan dukungan-dukungan walaupun secara fisik terpisah dengan siswa. Dukungan yang diberikan dapat berupa dukungan emosional, dukungan informasi, dukungan instrumental maupun dukungan penghargaan. The lack of student engagement often becomes the problem of distance learning. Amid this situation, students need academic supports. This research aims to investigate the perspective of teachers on student engagement and to investigate supports that the teachers give to students.  This research employed a qualitative approach and thematic analysis method. Participants of this research were 23 Vocational High School teachers who implemented distance learning. Data was gathered by means of a questionnaire containing open-ended questions. Research results revealed that students have low behavioral engagement. For emotional engagement, some students showed negative feelings, but other students showed positive feelings. The same case with cognitive engagement. Although some students had low motivation, other students showed their efforts in distance learning.  In addition, results showed teachers provide supports to students such as emotional support, informational support, instrumental support, and appraisal supports

Bringing Local and Islamic Values in the English Teaching Method of UIN Sunan Kalijaga

Learning a foreign language can’t be seen as a ‘myopic isolated’ in which a certain knowledge only based on its certain field of study. A recent method of learning such as English as a second language has already focused on constructive theory, a multidisciplinary approach which combine some paradigms such as linguistic, psychology, and sociology2. In this sense, there are many aspects like socio-cultural involved, not only for the richness and comprehensive understanding of the teaching itself, but also for conducting an interesting method of English teaching –learning as a foreign language. Since IAIN changed into UIN Sunan Kalijaga, this campus has transformed into a an integrated-interconnected university which’s not only implied in its vision but also in its policy and curricula. This concept is like a multidisciplinary in which a graduate of UIN Sunan Kalijaga should be able to know and introduced both Islam and ‘secular’ knowledge. To support this policy, one of the mission is to obligate students getting at least 400 score of TOEFL for the under-graduate program before they graduate from their faculties. One of this implementation is a centralization of language teaching. Since 2008, this university has conducted a centralized Arabic and English in which all students from all faculties must take an English and Arabic class in the Centre for the Language, Culture and Religion (Pusat Bahasa, Budaya dan Agama – PBBA)

Women and Violence in Popular Culture: A Portrayal of Social Construction and Media Commodification

The portrayal of women and violence is not something new in the world of literature and popular culture. The stories of witches and evil queens who are hungry for power in various fairy tales such as the story of Cinderella or Bawang Putih dan Bawang Merah have long been constructed in soap operas or television dramas in various parts of the world, including Indonesia. Here, although times and generations have changed, women's identity and violence remains and have always been an interesting theme for filmmakers. So not surprisingly, the representation of binary opposition, good women against evil woman in various versions and genres of soap operas still exists from generation to generation. Using the Stuart Hall’s theory of Representation and historiography approach, the study found that, in addition to a black-and-white portrait by two female figures considered to have a small risk by industry, the construction of the 'classic fairy tale' was always subconsciously acceptable to the audience despite to the gender bias. Keywords: women, violence, identity, soap operas, gender bia

Adab-International Conference on Information and Cultural Sciences “Cultural Literacy and Islam in the Post-Truth Society”

In the midst of current globalization and the development of science, various cultural problems and social gap among the people have become daily consumption. Lack of knowledge and illiteracy have led people to respond the dynamics of social and cultural changes differently. Thus, various issues related to cultural illiteracy, cultural shock, and being trapped into misleading information in many areas, have become serious problem lately. That is why, this millennial is sometimes called as disruptive era, in which truth has always been questioned. Concerning this, the Faculty of Adab and Cultural Sciences UIN Sunan Kalijaga considers that it is necessary to hold an international seminar to accommodate and communicate the researches, problems and thoughts related to the significance of cultural literacy in the development of the science, knowledge and civilization from local to international level. Focusing on the four scientific fields as the core of the faculty, namely Arabic Language and Literature, History of Islamic Culture, Library Science and English Literature, this annual conference is expected to be a forum for scientific synergy, strengthening strategy from the four majors related to cultural literacy, language, history and information. The purpose of this activity is to give opportunity for the researchers and academicians not only disseminating their researches and thoughts in the fields of adab and cultural sciences, but also updating policies of the related areas. This international conference also provides an overview of knowledge and trends of research with a global perspective related to information, language, history and culture. The theme of the conference this year is The Cultural Literacy and Islam in the Posttruth society. Here, the conference not only focuses on cultural literacy in Arabic and English studies but also touches the issues of trajectory of Islamic culture and civilization; contributions of the sciences and civilization to Indonesian Islam and world peace; strengthening Indonesian Islam through science of civilization; Information retrieval for preserving cultural heritage's purposes, etc. On behalf of faculty and committee, I would like express my deep appreciation and respect to the keynote speakers, invited speakers, presenters, participants and all or the parties who participate and contribute to this conference. Hopefully, this seminar would give much contribution not only for academicians and society but also for knowledge and humanity

Jilbab in Indonesia: The Contestation Between Power Relation and Social Identity1

As part of religious symbols, jilbab in Indonesia has shown a significant change. Not only because the proliferation of this Islamic fashion is visible across the multiple sites in this country, but also because Indonesia doesn’t have a historical and cultural background on Islamic fashion. Since the arrival of Islam in the 13th century, the distinctive symbol for Muslimah or women Muslim was like kerudung, or kind of headscarf combined with kebaya or baju kurung which used to be related to Melayu tradition. However, during this two decades, Islamic fashion has been developing in such tremendous way which seemingly create such a hybrid culture of fashion among the Muslims. If this transformation should be correlative with piety, how can we read Jilbab phenomenon in Indonesia? It’s a library research. The writer tried to relate the current phenomenon, religious issue as well as historical perspectives to support the data and analysis. The research shows that as part of religious symbols, jilbab is not predominantly seen as a sign which associates to a certain ideology or theological framework. Jilbab is much more seen as religious and social phenomena in which power relation contribute in driving the change both by providing and eliminating the room for it to develop. For example, during the New Order, the authority was so powerful and controlled the religious life including the ban of jilbab among the public sphere. This policy did not only create a resistance among the Muslim but also potentially provide a similar pattern for the following power . For instance, when the next regime gives freedom to the religious life and jilbab could eventually change the feature of Indonesian Muslims, in several areas, this kind of fashion has become such compulsory and turn into social identity. Even, like in Aceh, or West Sumatera, in line with the district autonomy policy, people think that they have a right to determine their identity including to make jilbab as compulsory for school uniform. Hence, in some decades, there’s a shift in perceiving jilbab, from theological perspective to religio-social identity

Reading Religion in the Movies , the Contestation between Religious Identity and Business Industry

The relationship of religion and movies actually has existed since this Industry began. As Andre Bazin (2002), writes, 'The cinema has always been interested in God'. Religion is something personal , in John Tillich terms, it is an area of culture that involve basic beliefs about the ultimate nature of reality, our purpose in the world, and we find a meaning in it. That is why, posing a religion or religious idea in the movies is always interesting for the producers or the film industry. However, film is indeed a cultural business, whatever presented on the screen is actually a construction of reality by people behind the screen. Focus on certain Hollywood and Indonesian movies, the research finds that the religious ideas in the movies have consistently appeared since the beginning of this industry, but it is part of co modification of product by using people’s intimacy in religious life, thus they feel represented