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The Folklore of Malin Kundang on Cat Avian and Buka Lapak Advertisements

1Yoga Pradana Wicaksono and 2Sudartomo Macaryus 1&2Universitas Sarjanawiyata Tamansiswa, 1&2Indonesia

To cite this article:

Wicaksono, Y.P & Macaryus, S. (2019). The Folklore of Malin Kundang on Cat Avian and Buka Lapak Advertisements. In D. S. Setiana, A. Setiawan, D. Supriadi, K. H. Najib, T. Ardhian, N. A. Handoyono, I. Widyastuti, & L. Tiasari (Eds.), International Conference on Technology, Education and Science (pp. 40–47). Yogyakarta. International Conference on Technology, Education and Sciences

InCoTES 2019 ISSN: 978-602-6258-14-4

The Folklore of Malin Kundang on Cat Avian and Buka Lapak Advertisements

Yoga Pradana Wicaksono1 and Sudartomo Macaryus2 Universitas Sarjanawiyata Tamansiswa, Indonesia 1&2 [email protected]

Article Info Abstract

Folklore is the part of verbally transferred kind of culture that is prone to Keywords extinction because as the time goes, less people read their children the bed time story that used to be the time where the folklore is passed down. The existence Folklore, of rumah dongeng to replace the bed time story as the media to preserve the Advertisement, Indonesian folklore gives a hope upon the existence and the development of the Incarnation, folklore. This paper aims to explain about the use of an Indonesian folklore Videos called Malin Kundang as the part of advertisements. The folklore of Malin Kundang is very well known within Indonesian society, especially within the academic society. Malin Kundang is a tale of a son named Malin Kundang who disowned his old and poor mother after he got back to his hometown from the far away land that gave him wealth. The mother got furious and cursed Malin into a stone. The plot of the folklore is used by two brands for their advertisements, they are Cat Avian (paint Avian) and Buka Lapak that are airing on the TV and can be accessed on YouTube. Theoretically, the process of changing narration into video becomes the focus of incarnation studies. By using text analysis and comparison methods, data in the form of plots in Malin Kundang's story are compared with plots used in Cat Avian and Buka Lapak advertisements. Folklore as a representation of the local wisdom that is passed down verbally at first contained educative values. Meanwhile, Cat Avian and Buka Lapak advertisements include commercial advertisements to suggest potential consumers to be interested in using the products offered. The analysis was carried out by comparing the events in Malin Kundang's folklore with events in the Cat Avian and Buka Lapak advertisements. The results of the study indicate that there is an advertising strategy in utilizing events in folklore that serves to suggest potential consumers of users of Cat Avian and Buka Lapak products.

Keywords: Folklore, Advertisement, Incarnation, Videos

Introduction

The folklore Malin Kundang is about a character who was already popular in the community. The folklore of Malin Kundang is very well known within Indonesian society, especially within the academic society. Malin Kundang is a tale of a son named Malin Kundang who disowned his old and poor mother after he got back to his hometown from the far away land that gave him wealth. The mother got furious and cursed Malin into a stone. The Indonesian know about Malin Kundang's story and put him as a figure who has immoral attitude towards his own mother. He denied his mother for she was old and poor. On the contrary, the mother who cursed her child is seen as someone who is not merciful for she was a parent who had the heart cursed the son to pay back what he had done.

Morals become signs to determine how to do right and wrong (Cushman, Kumar, & Railton, 2017; Nikolaeva & Popova, 2014) using certain perspectives. The set of morals place the kids to be rather obedient and respectful towards the parents and the parents to try their hardest to make their children happy. Internalization of these values lasts throughout life. One of the challenges in moral internalization is to prepare knowledge and values that ensure learners know how to respond to ethical situations and make ethical decisions. For the purposes of this International Conference on Technology, Education and Science (InCoTES) 2019 41

internalization,(Saat, Rahman, & Rajab, 2012:1683) recommends ethics education by adopting problem-based and student-centered learning, such as role playing, debating, discussing, and case studies. These methods are considered effective for instilling ethical values in students. Thus, folklore and its modification into advertising have the opportunity to be used as a focus of problems for role playing material, debates, discussions, and case studies.

These methods are currently supported by the wave of information that has the potential to be used as a learning resource. Negative impressions on television screens and other media by (Gökçearslan, 2010:5270) are seen as getting input from real life. Impressions of women characters who actively work to build a positive image of women. Therefore, producers need to be careful in order to help the community (children) to make the right choice in the future. Marjan syrup television commercials are designed based on the folklore of Timun Emas, internalizing the virtues of a peaceful life and avoiding conflicts of paying back. The giant was chasing Timun Emas to prey on her. But when the giant was about to sink into the mud, Timun Emas saved him. The drink advertising phenomenon has the potential to be a subject of discussion, debate, and discussion of problem-based moral education.

Whereas student-centered moral education takes place by applying storytelling methods that have the potential to increase student interest, motivation, and achievement in moral education. The method of storytelling also increases students' understanding of moral values because they are actively involved in group discussions and creating a conducive and pleasant learning environment (Nair, Yusof, & Hong, 2014:3994). Regarding advertising media, theoretically is a way to suggest potential consumers to be interested in using the products or services offered. Limited interviews with some beverage consumers stated that advertising does not create new needs. Attractive and impressive ad impressions make it easy for consumers to remember the product brand. Commercial ad impressions are reminiscent of studies conducted by (Urbonavičius & Adomavičiūtė, 2015:625) regarding consumerative and charitable actions. The results of the study of these two actions are of significant theoretical and managerial implication for marketing and charity. The results of the study of the two actions are recognized to still have limitations related to the fact because there is no empirical evidence available to confirm. Therefore, empirical studies on this issue are highly recommended.

The Media Change of Folklore The media change of literatures, including folklore to film, are theoretically a change from verbal narratives to visual narratives. The media change of literatures continues to take place until now in Indonesia. Quantitatively, (Praharwati & Romadhon, 2017) presented data since 2007-2015 there are 42 movie titles which are the result of media changing of literatures. Other studies were conducted by (Purnomo & Kustoro, 2018) and (Istadiyantha, 2017). Determination of the novel to the big screen happens based on the fame of the novels as best sellers ones. However, the use of folklore as a basis for advertising is still limited quantitatively. Said by Creese, Wu, & Blackledge (2009:363), folklore is a medium for accepting or rejecting culture. Malin Kundang's placement as a lawless child shows the community's rejection of his disrespectful behavior towards parents. Furthermore, the community accepted the actions of Malin Kundang's parents who condemned their children.

In folklore, acceptance and rejection occur through interaction and reading. As an oral tradition, the reading is done verbally. The reading process uses folklore as an iconic artifact of culture to be retold across time and space. Cross space and time allow for various variations. Therefore, folklore tends to have various versions. The media change for folklore that is currently appearing produces one variant of folklore. Transfers also occur in literary works into films that require adaptation from verbal narratives to visual narratives. The study of the transfer of literature into films was carried out by the Deppman (2010:1) on Chinese literature and cinema. It was also said that the transfer of literature to film was still routinely treated as a discipline that was parallel with each other's aesthetic order.

The media change from verbal to visual narration still use verbal language. The use of language in verbal stories is different from the use of language in films, especially when converted into advertising media. The results of (Sabbagh & Saghaei, 2014:302) state that there is no use of language that is truly neutral, objective, value-free. Folklore tends to function educatively, while advertisements prioritize commercial aspects. It also said that there is no best interpretation. Each story is open to interpretations including opposites, when diverse elements such as text, context, and readers create meaning.

The various media changes from verbal to digital are accommodated by (Dudacek, 2015:695) who offer the transmedia socialization way like comic, books, videos, and animation. The technology 4.0 and the society 5.0 have the chance to form the format interactive application to give preferences and instructions based on the content and the educational goal along with other goals. 42 Wicaksono & Macaryus

Method

This research is about the media change of the folklore to advertisement video that is based on literature data and the ad video. Most of the data is served as the base line to differentiate the plot of the story that is presented and modified in the ad between the real plot of the folklore and the advertisement. Even though the advertisement was made based on the structure of the folklore, does it really have the same exact plot of the story? And if there are differences between the two, does it have the same purpose? The illustration process then is done by semiotic way where every phenomenon is seen as connected to one another.

Results and Discussion

The tale of Malin Kundang is the story that includes in the verbal literature of the Minangkabau people. It is certainly different compared to other verbal literature as it has its own special things on its beginning and end of the story that are in the form of rhymes and its main body as a poem. There are various versions of the story of Malin Kundang, the most well known one is in the show of rebab in Minangkabau that tells the story of Malin Kundang, the son who neglected and denied his own mother.

Malin Kundang lived with his mother who is very old on a mountain in Padang. He collected the woods and sold them to earn money. They lived in a small shack with the limitation of food and wealth. Malin then had an idea to go to the far away land after he saw a ship docked at the beach of Muara Padang. To go to the far away land seems to be the only way to get a better job and earn more money to get a better life. It was like a one most effective way to solve the problem of the poverty.

Malin told his mother about his plan to go to the far away land for a better job. However, it did not go the way he wanted it, his mother got upset to hear her son’s plan. The mother was not ready to be left by her only son. But one way or another, Malin’s determination to go to the far away land changed his mother’s mind and with the heavy heart the mother let Malin go to the far away land.

Malin started his career as the ship crew. In the far away land he showed nothing but his amazing work ethic and for that he was the favorite of the captain among others. When he was a ship crew, Malin got a lot of knowledge. The journey from one island to another gave him the advantage of skill and experience at trading. In fact, the profit of the ship went up because of Malin and he was then promoted to be the captain of the ship after the former captain passed away.

But before the captain passed away, because Malin was his favorite, he invited Malin to go with him to his hometown where Malin met the captain’s daughter, Ambun Sori. After the captain passed away and Malin now was the captain of the ship, he got married to the former captain’s daughter. Malin’s wife never left his side and had always been there in the ship with him which pushed him to sail and trade better. His happy life made him missed his hometown.

Malin’s homesickness led the ship to the Muara Padang Harbor. When he got there people were amazed by the changes in Malin’s life. He used to be the poor guy and now he went back to his hometown with a ship that he rode.the news about Melin coming home reached to his mother. Soon enough, his mother who had been missing her son was looking for him to meet him.however, instead of getting the warm hug from Malin, he chose to ignore and deny the fact that the old and poor woman was his mother.

Disappointed and hurt by the son, Malin’s mother then prayed to punish her own son who disowned her. By then, Malin decided to continue his journey with his ship where he had to go through huge storms. The ship was not strong enough to go through the storms and it got destroyed by the storms. By then, Malin realized that he mistreated his mother and his mother’s prayer was granted by God that gave him huge storms. But the regret hit Malin too late and before he knew it he was cursed to a stone by her mother for what he did.

The tale of Malin Kundang is used for trading in Indonesia. The advertisements that adopted the story of Malin Kundang are the advertisements of Cat Avian and Buka Lapak. However, it was not the whole story of Malin Kundang that was adopted. Due to the time limit of the advertisement, the creators only picked some important plots of the story that would also represent their products.

Some parts of Malin Kundang tale were not adopted to the advertisement. The media change from the verbal literature to visual product caused the modification that was done under the ground and on the bright sunlight. Other than that, the modification also caused the change of the essence of the story. On the other side of the screen, International Conference on Technology, Education and Science (InCoTES) 2019 43

the audience who has not watched or read the true story of Malin Kundang might get affected by the modified version of the story.

The Media Change in Cat Avian Advertisement The first discussion is about the advertisement of Cat Avian, this advertisement use to air in Indonesian television in 2014. The 30 seconds advertisement only showed two characters and those are Malin and his mother. Other than that, the plot that was in the advertisement of Cat Avian was about the time when Malin decided to go to the far away land.

The story of Malin Kundang in the Cat Avian ad was different from the real story. Cat Avian told the story of Malin that was far from poverty. That was shown by the supposedly Malin’s house that was spacious and beautiful for the kind of paint that was used. Malin’s mother was also portrayed as a woman who was not that old and had farms around the house. Malin himself left the house for only two days based on the Cat Avian ad before he decided to go back home to meet his mother and see his beautiful house again. His homesickness was caused by him missing the beautiful house that had been painted with Cat Avian.

The adaptation of Malin story in the advertisement of Cat Avian is far from the real story. There are many modifications done that are the opposite story of the real one. Modifications were done on Malin’s life that was supposedly miserable in poverty and his mother that was supposedly very old and poor.

The story that has been known by the people tells the story about the poor Malin Kundang and his mother. They tried to earn a living from chopping off the woods and selling them. The story is different compared to the one that is presented in Cat Avian advertisement where malin and his mother lived far from being poor with their wealth, house, farm, and livestock. The facilities completed their lives along with the beautiful house. The beauty that impressed Malin for Cat Avian had been applied to the wall.

The difference between the original version to the Cat Avian version seems to be very obvious at the end of the advertisement. In the original story it was told that malin disowned his mother when he got back from the far away land after years and years, whereas in the Cat Avian ad he was not the one who walked away from home for longer than two days. Other than that, in the Cat Avian version Malin was not the one who was cursed into stone but it was someone else whose identity was not explained.

Picture 1: the house that got Malin cming back to the hometown after only two days (source: Cat Avian advertisement).

The modification in the Cat Avianad was done for the marketing purpose of wall paint. Malin who disowned his mother and left his hometown in the original story was told to be the one who missed the hometown and his mother.for Malin had applied the wall paint Cat Avian before he left, he went back to see the house admitting that he missed the house more than he missed his mother.

The utilizing of Malin Kundang story to market Cat Avian gives certain suggestion to the people. Cat Avian is pictured as an attractive product and will be missed by those people whose house is painted with it. The everyday people would absolutely get captured by the beauty of the house that has had Cat Avian applied on the walls for it worked to make Malin missed his house and his mother. Other than giving a suggestion, the impressive ad that is based on folklore will make the people remember the name of the brand better. Therefore, even though there are various brands of wall paints, people will always recognize Cat Avian as a brand and would rather choose Cat Avian compared to others. 44 Wicaksono & Macaryus

The Media Change of Buka Lapak Advertisement The next media change from a verbal literature to visual product is found in the advertisement of Buka Lapak. The 16 seconds advertisement used to air in Indonesian television within 2017-2018. The plot that is adapted to this ad was the scene where Malin was disowning his own mother who was looking for him. The scene was the part of the climax before Malin was cursed by his mother and turned into a stone.

The story of Malin Kundang in Buka Lapak was pictured as if he just got back from the far away land. Malin was wearing the typical clothes that would be worn by the royals, a sign that he had made a life in the far away land. The next scene pictured Malin was sailing on the ocean and his journeys were nothing but success. The next scene is where Malin disowned his own mother and walked pass the shore heading to his ship. The scene pictured in the Buka Lapak ad was the quiet surroundings of the beach with cloudy sky before the storm.

The Buka Lapak ad showcased the mother of Malin as an old poor lady. It showed through the clothes that she was wearing on the ad that looks rather worn-out. She was holding onto a stick of wood to support her walking that shows that she was old and vulnerable. The physical condition was showed visually.

The focus of the Malin Kundang story in Buka Lapak ad was when Malin denied his mother. Even though this part was not shown implicitly, we can all see from the act where the mother expressed her disappointment by saying “ I am your mother, you are an ungod….” before she was cut by another character. The unfinished statement by the mother can be predicted as if the mother was about to say “ungodly”. The statement fits into the preseption of the people that put Malin as the ungodly child who is not wanted by the people for the characteristic doesn’t fit into the social norms, children should respect their parents.

The Buka Lapak ad maintained some parts of the original story of Malin Kundang. Though, there are some parts that have been adjusted to the goal of the advertisement itself by connecting the story of Malin Kundang with the Buka Lapak products advertisement. The parts that were maintained are the characters like Malin that was pictured as a son that went to the far away land and then made a fortune out of himself but then he disowned and denied his own mother for she was poor and old. Other than that, the character of the mother was also maintained as it was written on the original story where she was picture as an old, vulnerable, and poor woman. Another part that was maintained in the advertisement was when Malin ignored and left his mother behind. The scene where the mother got angry and disappointed ready to curse Malin Kundang was also maintained.

Modification that was done gave the effect on the ending of the story compared to the original story. The adjustment of the story also can be seen when another character that had nothing to do with the story of Malin Kundang popped out. that character is a stone that had a human head and could talk. The new character twist the plot at the end of the story, the scene where Malin Kundang was supposedly being cursed into a stone changed into a scene where Malin and his mother made up their relation as mother and son.

The new character popup creates an assumption that parents shouldn’t be thinking negative about their children. The mother who cursed the son does not go along with the norms where parents should set themselves as an example to always pray for the best for their children even when the children disappoint them. The good prayer will always come out to a good thing but instead Malin’s mother chose to pray for the bad.

International Conference on Technology, Education and Science (InCoTES) 2019 45

Picture 2: a gift from Buka Lapak (Source Buka Lapak advertisement).

Modification that was made on that scene is a form of the effort to insert the message of the advertisement. The Buka Lapak ad was intended to offer discount and a prize of a car for the lucky consumers that had been using their application for trading. Implementation of facility of Buka Lapak as the main market place was pictured as one good thing that needs to be appreciated.

Conclusion The result of the analysis show that the folklore of Malin Kundang that was adapted as the base for the Cat Avian and Buka Lapak ads experienced deconstruction and reconstruction based on the product they tried to offer. In the Cat Avian ad deconstruction happened to the characters and the social plot. The character of Malin Kundang and his mother were pictured as a family with enough wealth with beautiful house, a farm, and livestock. The beautiful house is used to showcase the product of wall pain Cat Avian and placed it as the charm that made Malin Kundang went back to his house after only two days away from it.

On the other hand, the Buka Lapak ad offered a space to start online business and focused on the anger of Malin Kundang’s mother. Despite the fact that he just got back from the far away land, Malin Kundang seemed to walk towards his ship about to leave his hometown and his mother for his mother is just an old, vulnerable, and poor woman. But Malin’s mother’s sentence when she was about to cursed Malin “ I am your mother, you are an ungod….” was cut off and her anger was redirected to opening a business on Buka Lapak. Psychologically anger requires energy, bravery, and spirit. Therefore, this advertisement constructed that the energy of anger should be redirected to support the spirit of opening a new business.

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Authors Information Yoga Pradana Wicaksono Sudartomo Macaryus Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra Indonesia, FKIP, UST Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra Indonesia, FKIP, UST Jl. Jl. Batikan UH III/1043, Tuntungan, Tahunan, Batikan UH III/1043, Tuntungan, Tahunan, Umbulharjo, Umbulharjo, Yogyakarta 55167 Yogyakarta 55167 Contact : +62 89630525032 E-mail Address: [email protected]