Selangor,Malaysia

KyotoKyotoUniversity University Southeast Asian Studies, Vel. 26, No. 2, September 1988 ' on Malaysia A PreliminaryReport theJavaneseinSelangor, Teruo SEKIMOTO* One of the prominent features of Sabak Bernam is that the majority of the popula- I Introdu ¢ tion tion there are whb first immigrated 'area Jayanese 1910s and 1930s This is a preliminary report on research I to this between the conducted at Parit Baru in the District of frem many difflerent areas of Central and they are ethnically Sabak Bernam, Selangor. The research Eastern Java.Though covered fbrty days in August and Javanese, from the Malaysian point of view period 'of are as one many sub- September 1987, including library work at they classified of contrast the the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia and a groups the Malays, in to Indians, and the Orang Asli. brief field trip to a rural area of Johor. Chinese,'the Bernam are now Field research in Sabak Bernam itself was The Javanese in Sabak assimilated nation. conducted for two weeks in the first half of fully intothe Malaysian There are everywhere in the area, September.i' Since my field research was of Javanese including a number of local a preliminary nature, and is to be fo11owed government othcials and employees. They still speak by longer, more intensive work at the same mother But, ex- location, this is only a limited attempt to Javanese as their tongue. cept for some very old ones, rnost of thern are present a general view of the area and its people.2> bilingual, speaking Bahasa Malaysia very fluently and sharing the marked local accent * eeZgwa*l, Institute of Oriental Culture, The with other local Malays who are not University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo- ku, Tokyo 113. Japan Javanese. 1) Research was made possible by grants from Society Promotion ef Sci- Thus, is about the in a the Japan forthe thispaper Javanese ences and the Hitachi Foundation. I am Malaysian rural community. These Javanese indebted to many individuals and institutions in Malaysia that helped me in the course of are not a minority group who have migrated I research･ Because oflimitation of space, can to a totally unfamiliar environment already : mention only a few of them Socio-Economic Prime Minister's De- Research Unit of the inhabited by quite different people with a partment generously approved my research ; difTerent culture. They haye become Dr. Shamsul and many others in Uniyersiti Malaysia me both warrn Kebangsaan' gave Malaysian Malays without much dithculty as hospitality and valuable guidance for the research. far as the ethnic relation between them and Some of accounts in this article may sound 2) other Malay sub-groups is concerned. They self-evident to Malaysians and Malaysianists. still maintain their ethni6 as But I am addres$ing this report not just to identity them but also to the Japanese reading public Javanese, particularly their language, and who are not necessarily familiar with the social conditions of Malaysia. they tend to concentrate in their own village 175 NII-Electronic Library Service KyotoKyotoUniversity University Mut7ti7utM 26ig2e communities. But, despite these facts, they ability of the Javanese in Java to the govern- have incorporated themselves into the mental and cultural hierarchies are fully ex- Malay community in Malaysia. ploited by the present Indonesian govern- The faet that they are at the same time ment as an important resource in running Javanese and Malays of the Malaysian na- the modern state of the Republic of tion presents an interesting problem, because Indonesia. When I conducted field research the Javanese (in Java) and the Malays as in Central Java, the omnipresence of the an ethnic category (in Indonesia and governmental and cultural hierarchy was Malaysia) are often contrasted in oppositional striking.3' It permeated in quite concrete terms. Students in Indonesian studies often forms as far as the everyday thoughts and suggest that there is a marked diffbrence in actions of villagers are concerned. For overall cultural traits between the Javanese example, every government oficial frorn (and perhaps the Balinese, too) on one hand, central to village levels seemed to represent and several major ethnic groups in Sumatra, the authority and dignity of the state vis-a-vis coastal areas of Borneo (called Kalimantan the cemmon masses who were ruled. The in Indonesia), and Sulawesi, on the other. notion of hierarchy was even internalized by individual villagers in their ways of speech They tend to see the Javanese and other groups in Western Indonesia in a diehoto- and behaviour. In contrast to this, it seems mous scheme, and stress the uniqueness of to me that the Javanese at Sabak Bernam without the of such a Jewanese culture in contrast to others. This live heavy burden uniqueness is usually attributed to the secial hierarchy. T!he difference I found the and Javanese tradition of large-scale kingdoms between Javanesein CentralJelva with a highly sophisticated court culture, Sabak Barnam presents further questions. which was deeply influenced by the Indic What framework can we adopt te explain tradition before it was Islamized. It is this difference?Is it attributable to the dithrence between two contemporary states also pointed out, a little exaggeratedly and -Malaysia and Indonesia-in conceptual- impressionistically, that the Javanese are more used to the complex network of izing and operating the state and statecraft? Do diffbrences in ecology and mode of sub- governmental hierarchy, more accomodative to collective actions, and more obedient to sistence play any part? Hew do Javanese higher authorities, while peoples of other in Sabak Bernam view their world? What is their of self, society, ethnic groups are less tightly bound to perception power, collective order, more straightforward, and and authority? Though it is not rny intention te put more stress on individual strength and jump power. to any quick conclusion in this preliminary report, I write with these in mind, Though I suspect the usefulness of sweep- questions and try to some idea how ina ing generalizatiens, which are often fbund in give Javanese arguments about ethnic or national charac- 3) I conducted fieldwork in Sukohaejo regency of ters, I believe that the sensitivity and adapt- Central Java in 1975, and in 1978-79. 176 NII-Electronic Library Service KyotoKyotoUniversity University T. SEKIMOTO: A Pre}iminary Report on the Javanese in Selangor, Malaysia particular locality of Peninsular Malaysia are ongoing research preject. I shall have to difTerent from their counterparts in Java. In wait for a future occasien to pursue researeh other words, this is an attempt to explore in that direction. how and to what extent the Javanese can II A Profile ef Sabak Bernam be different among themselves according District to different social environments. I hope that the comparative framework I fo11ow will The village of Parit Baru Baroh where cast a new light on the present situation of I stayed for the field research is located in rural Malays in a particular part ofSelangor. Sabak Bernam district at the north-western That is what our joint research prQject fringe of the State of Selangor (see Fig, 1). generally aims at. Administratively, the district (deerak) is I should also note here that my comparative divided into six subdistricts (m"kim), each framework is a synchronic one; that is, I of which is then further divided into several Baroh compare present-day Javanese in Sabak villages (kampueqs'). Parit Baru is Barnam with those in Central Java. Syn- one of those villages in the subdistrict of chronic comparison of two communities in Sungai Air [[iawar. different geographical areas cannot avoid Sabak Bernam district has a land area of arbitrariness to some extent, and I hope I 995 square kilometers and a population of can complement this by a diachroniccom- 103,261. About seventy percent of them are parison or a search into the historical process Malays, while Chinese and Indians repre- of change in one and the same community. sent respectively twenty-five percent and If I can obtain reliable information about five percent of the population (in 1987; Table Though no are secial conditions in the particular local corn- see 1). statistics munities in Java where the forefathers of available about the exact numbers of each the Javanese in Sabak Bernam lived at the ethnic group among the Malays, a number turn of the century, our understanding of of local peopre told me that the Javanese Sabak Bernam would be much deepened. are the largest group, while the Banjarese, But this will be a hard task. I interviewed who originally migrated from the southern several elder]y people of the community part of Indonesian Borneo, are second. who migrated from Java themselves. But Sumatran peoples, such as Kamparese and so far I have only obtained piecemeal infor- Table 1 Pepulation of Sabak Bernam by mation about their early lives after they Ethnicity came to Malaya. These oral histories can Malays 72,77g be supplemented by and governmental ehinese 25,509 other records in Malaysia from the early Indians 4, 927 part of this century. But a further histor- Others 47 ical survey on the social conditions of the Total 103, 261 localities of which they ]eft particular Java Source: Sabak Bernam District Information is not intended in this paper, or in my Office, 1987 177 NII-Electronic Library Service KyotoKyotoUniversity University MM7Y7ME 26g2E Tleluk Intan o PERAK ' tgf.k "AN ,?"(.x...L..-L" r-'. X･v. x 1 s.... BesarO ' s abak Bern m x J. N :-1 1 xSekinehano Kuala Selangor PAHANG K N x.. N Kua]a Lumpue o ? r ffp l es --/ r-'-- ･ sokni t l NEGERI SEMB]LAN Fig, 1 Selangor Minangkabau, are also found in the area.

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