Ethnicity and the Performance of Identity

This essay looks into the novels of two Indonesian women writers, Perempuan Kembang Jepun (Lan Fang 2009) and Dimsum terakhir (Clara Ng 2006), which depict the struggles of the major female characters in negotiating their ”hybrid” identities amidst the pulls from various opposing forces that try to impose and define their identities. Both works were published in the post-New Order Indonesia, where identity politics seems to dominate the political and cultural realms. Both Lan Fang and Clara Ng try to problematize the rigid and monolithic sense of cultural identity that had been inculcated by the previous regime through its aggressive assimilation policy and imposition of the state ideology of unity. The essay aims at examining different strategies employed by both authors in redefining identity through approaches that see identity as a fluid, non-essentialist, and on-going process rather than a given entity or label that can be simply inscribed on individuals

Meninjau Kembali Hubungan Antara Sastra Dan Budi Pekerti

Hubungan sastra dan budi pekerti telah lama ramai diperbincangkan orang. Ada tuntutan dalam masyarakat bahwa sastra haruslah dapat menjadi sarana pembelajaran moral dan pekerti untuk dapat dinilai sebagai karya sastra yang baik.Timbulnya banyak hujatan pada sejumlah karya sastra, baik di dalam negeri maupun dalam sejarah kesusastraan berbagai bangsa di dunia, mengukuhkan asumsi bahwa sastra yang baik adalah sastra yang diabdikan pada pendidikan moral.Tulisan ini menyoroti berbagai asumsi tersebut dengan memperlihatkan bahwa banyak karya besar dunia justru menggugat hubungan linear dan positif antara sastra dan pendidikan budi pekerti. Tulisan ini juga berargumen bahwa sastra terkadang justru berperan sebagai instrumen untuk menggugat superioritas nilai-nilai moral tertentu, serta menawarkan cara lain untuk memahami wujud hubungan antara sastra dan moralitas. Lewat sejumlah telaah atas karya-karya sastra Indonesia dan dunia, seperti sastra Jerman, dibahas kondisi hubugan antara sastra dan moralitas di Indonesia. Kesimpulan akhir yang diajukan adalah diperlukan perspektif alternatif untuk memahami kembali bentuk-bentuk relasi yang lebih setara antara sastra dan budi pekerti, sehingga sastra bisa ditempatkan secara proporsional dalam kapasitasnya sebagai agen sosialisasi moral ataupun agen Perubahan moral

Ethnicity and the performance of identity

This essay looks into the novels of two Indonesian women writers, Perempuan Kembang Jepun (Lan Fang 2009) and Dimsum terakhir (Clara Ng 2006), which depict the struggles of the major female characters in negotiating their ”hybrid” identities amidst the pulls from various opposing forces that try to impose and define their identities. Both works were published in the post-New Order Indonesia, where identity politics seems to dominate the political and cultural realms. Both Lan Fang and Clara Ng try to problematize the rigid and monolithic sense of cultural identity that had been inculcated by the previous regime through its aggressive assimilation policy and imposition of the state ideology of unity. The essay aims at examining different strategies employed by both authors in redefining identity through approaches that see identity as a fluid, non-essentialist, and on-going process rather than a given entity or label that can be simply inscribed on individuals.KEYWORDSWomen writers, cultural identity, post-New Order Indonesia

MUSLIM DIASPORIC IDENTITIES IN KAMILA SHAMSIE’S HOME FIRE (2017)

Beside accepted with surprise across the world, the winning of Brexit referendum also brings up the tangled web into the United Kingdom’s political and cultural realms. Recent studies mention there is correlation between the voting behavior and issues of identity, immigration, and Islamophobia. Kamila Shamsie alludes these issues in her latest novel, Home Fire (2017). By focusing on three main protagonists, this close-textual analysis examines how Pakistani diasporic community construct their identities within the novel. To support the analysis, this article draws upon Hall’s identity theory (1990) and Bhabha’s Unhomely (1992). Research findings show how Shamsie’s novel represents heterogeneity within Pakistani Muslims diasporic identities, rather than frame them within single collective identity. Therefore, the novel criticizes Eurocentric biases point of view by portraying Muslim female protagonists’ fluid identities while defending their Muslimness by using veil and praying to God. On the other hand, the novel maintains established stereotype by drawing Muslim male protagonist’s affiliation with Daesh as representation of radical group to problematize the notion of radicalism

Majalah sastra Pusat edisi 6 tahun 2014

Majalah ini merupakan majalah sastra yang diterbitkan oleh Badan Pengembangan dan Pembinaan Bahasa, Kementerian Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan. Majalah ini berisi berbagai karya sastra Indonesia seperti cerpen, puisi, dan sebagainya

Re-imagining the archipelago : the nation in post-Suharto Indonesian women's fiction

This study sets out to investigate the ways in which some fiction by Indonesian women authors produced since the downfall of President Suharto in 1998 explores the notion of ‘nation’ that was established by the New Order during its thirty-two-year rule, and offers alternative perspectives. The New Order’s ideology of the unitary state of Indonesia required, as its foremost prerequisite, the construction of a sense of Indonesianness that was neither fragmented nor centrifugal. The result, however, was not only a Java-centric perspective of a vast archipelago that consists of more than 13,000 islands, but even more narrowly, a Jakarta-centric envisioning of the entire nation. In 1998 the Reformasi started and these women authors, who are situated at the intersection of authoritarianism and democracy, attempted to redefine the nation from diverse perspectives as women, while at the same time struggling against the pull to reinscribe the New Order’s discourse of a monolithic national identity. Different authors offer a range of viewpoints: from spatial angles that encompass urban, archipelagic, and cosmopolitan outlooks, to cultural dimensions that include Islam, adat, and ethnicity. These strategies of representation are analyzed using various feminist theories and approaches, especially those which are concerned with the notion of “symbolic space” as a “para-site” located in the margin of the dominant power, as proposed by scholars such as Ien Ang (2001), Rey Chow (1993), and bell hooks (1990). This study not only opens up a new approach to reading post-1998 Indonesian women’s fiction in the context of constructions of Indonesianness, but also furthers understanding of how cultural production in present-day Indonesia struggles to distance itself from the cultural and political legacy of the New Order, and at the same time is influenced by the long-lasting effects of that legacy.Arts, Faculty ofAsian Studies, Department ofGraduat

Treading the Path of the Shari'a: Indonesian Feminism at the Crossroads of Western Modernity and Islamism

The downfall of Suharto’s New Order in 1998 has opened up a new era of political freedom and participation for activists and for groups that try to promote emancipatory agendas as well as for political Islamists keen on introducing tougher conservative, religious measures to society. Women’s activism and participation in different sectors has flourished, and their voices have had much stronger echoes in the political dynamics of the country. However, the new era has also given rise to Islamic radicalism that is also hostile to feminist causes and perceives feminism as part of the Western hegemonic project. In such a slippery political terrain, women’s movements in Indonesia have to remake the image of feminism in Indonesian terms so that it cannot be dismissed as an ideology imported from the West and, simultaneously, they must develop a home-grown counter-discourse against the mainstream interpretation of sacred texts by using the same sources of knowledge that the Islamists employ. To what extent women activists have succeeded or failed in their struggles to free Indonesian Muslim women from the shackles of the male-dominated reading of Islamic dogma, and what the future trajectories of their struggles might be, are the primary concerns of this essay