Part 1 Exploring the Reflexivity of Pain and Privilege Dian Mitrayani

PART 1 EXPLORING THE REFLEXIVITY OF PAIN AND PRIVILEGE DIAN MITRAYANI

1. NAVIGATING THE AMBIGUITY OF MIXED IDENTITY AS CHINESE-INDONESIAN

BEING PERANAKAN: THE FORGETTING OF PAST IDENTITY

I will begin my narrative by describing my own identity. I am a millennial woman of Chinese descent, born in Indonesia. I am the oldest among three siblings. I grew up in Surabaya, the second largest city in Indonesia. Indonesia consists of 236.7 million people and more than 600 ethnic groups, with Chinese comprising 1.2% of the population (Arifin, Hasbullah, & Pramono, 2016). Despite the small percentage, the Chinese are the 15th largest ethnic group in Indonesia. The Chinese Indonesian position has been seen as ambiguous and uncertain (Ang, 2001). Since colonial times, the Chinese have been subjected to “othering” in Indonesia because of their cultural and religious differences, their perceived dominance in the economy, and their purported complicity with Communism (Allen, 2003). The legacy of Suharto’s New Order regime,1 which unofficially continues to the present day, divided Indonesian citizens into pribumi (native) and non-pribumi (non-native). This division is an artificial national construct because there is no single pribumi identity in context of ethnic origin (Heryanto, 1999). Yet, this internal diversity of ethnic is ignored, placing the Chinese Indonesian in a single category as non-pribumi, or foreign, “other” (Hoon, 2008). The diversity of Chinese Indonesians also appears nationwide. Ethnic groups of Chinese Indonesian mostly originate from the Hokkien, Teochiu, Hakka, and Cantonese, where each has their own language, dialect, culture, and place of residency (Allen, 2003; Arifin et al., 2016). In broader categories, some Chinese Indonesians identified themselves as totok, somebody who still can trace back their family ancestry into China and usually are first or a more recent generation (Aguilar, 2001; Freedman, 2003). Totok Chinese also speak the Chinese language or Chinese ethnic dialect and practice various Chinese traditions. My parents identify themselves as peranakan, a descendant of Chinese born in Indonesia who speak Indonesian or the regional language as their first language (Pausacker, 2005). Another definition of peranakan also highlights the possibility of some mixed Indonesian blood in their lineage (Coppel, 2002). Peranakan do not adhere to the traditional Chinese culture yet adopt some Chinese customs such as marrying with another Chinese descent (Pitt, 2005). The status of peranakan also described as a person in the state of in-between, where someone is not considered as a 100% Chinese or 100% Indonesian. Peranakan is defined as “Cina wurung, Londa durung, Jawa tanggung