Java Language Maintenance in Muna
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JTE Journal of Teaching of English Volume 6 No. 2 (June 2021) e-ISSN: 2548-6810 Java Language Maintenance In Muna Rajabindra Jaya1, Hanna2, Lelly Suhartini3 [email protected] 1,2,3Halu Oleo University, Indonesia ABSTRACT This research discussed Java language maintenance by Javanese people living at Bangunsari, Muna. It focused on condition in several domains as family, school, neighbourhoods, mosque, and mass media as well as the researcher reviewed in terms of age groups, and causal factors leading to the language maintenance. The data were interview and conversation with the Javanese people at Bangunsari. Design used was qualitative research through ethnography approach. The researcher used observation, recording, and interview as the instruments to get data. The result showed that Javanese people who lived at Bangunsari village more frequently used Java language in their daily life. In the domain of family, Javanese people were monolingual as personally, bilingual with code mixing and code switching as well as in the domain of neighbourhoods. As in the domain of school, they personally were qualified as monolingual speakers with code switching. Religion domain showed that the Javanese people personally were qualified as monolingual speakers with code mixing in bilingual situation as well as in groups of age in 10 up to 50 years old and above still used Java language even though they mixed or switched into bahasa. The causal factors that lead the language maintenance of Java language were number of speakers, loyalty and awareness of Java language, continuity of Java language usage, and the power of Java language and other factors reviewed from sociolinguistic perspectives such as population mobility, culture and tradition, education, and religion. Keywords: Language Maintenance, Java Language, Javanese, Monolingual, Bilingual 1. Introduction Indonesia is a country that consists of many islands and provinces. It is also a great nation that has a lot of diversities. One of which is language. There are many languages used by the people in each region of the province. The total number of regional languages in Indonesia is 652 regional languages. This is as stated by the Head of the Ministry of Education and Culture Language Development Dadang Suhendra (2018) that based on the latest data, Indonesia has 652 regional languages, such as Muna language, Bugis language, Java language, Madura language, Bali language etc. Each area in Indonesia has own vernacular which is used by local 203 Journal of Teaching of English Vol. 6 No. 2 (June 2021) community that makes the community is different from other areas. Every vernacular language has its own rule to arrange a proper conversation politely. Many people in Indonesia use vernacular in communicating and interacting among them in their daily life. The general function of regional language itself is as an identity symbol of an area. Vernacular is also sometimes used to talk about something secret in a community. In the law itself, it is stated that language is a wealth that must be protected by the country, as explained in Republic of Indonesia Law Number 24 of 2009 concerning flags, languages, and state symbols, as well as national anthem article 42 paragraphs (1), (2), and (3). Part of the content of the law is that regional government is obliged to develop, foster and protect regional language and literature so that it continues to fulfil its position and function in community life in accordance with the times and to remain a part of Indonesia's cultural wealth (Kamaludin, 2016). Thus, regional languages must be maintained and preserved by people who use the language because regional languages are the wealth of Indonesian nation itself. In a community, there are various people and tribes who also bring their own language in the community. Besides using national language that is Bahasa Indonesia, many societies in Indonesia also use their vernaculars for communication. For example Munanese people use Muna language as a daily language to communicate between them and also Javanese people use Java language as well as the other tribes. Hence, it could be stated that Indonesian people are bilingualism or multilingualism. Commonly, each tribe in Indonesia has their particular region, but there are phenomena where one area consists of different vernaculars. In such area, there is a possibility that vernacular of minority people will be affected by dominant one and also there is a vernacular that can survive even though it is from minority groups. Therefore, we can get a language maintenance and also language shift from the case. Language maintenance occurs when a language community still maintains its language usage. According to Siregar in Manik (2015), language maintenance is the use of language that occurs in a language society that still uses its language in the domains of language usage which is traditionally controlled by the language. It is often found linguistic cases in society that the use of native language by a number of speakers of a bilingual or multilingual society tends to decrease due to the existence of other languages that have a higher function. The use of Javanese at Bangunsari by the people in the village is more predominantly used than the use of other languages such as Indonesia or local language which is Muna language. This is due to factor of the large number of Javanese people at Bangunsari. So, the condition of Muna language itself in this village is quite weak because its role is replaced by Java language which makes some of ordinary people affected by using Java language. Society who lives in a multi-ethnic environment can get the culture and language of each ethnic group. This can cause a shift or extinction in terms of language or culture for groups that are unable to maintain their language and culture. However, this is different from the Javanese people who lived at Bangunsari. Although the Javanese people in the village have been there for a long time, but they are able to maintain their mother’s language. 204 Journal of Teaching of English Vol. 6 No. 2 (June 2021) Regarding the issue, this research discussed language maintenance of Java language by Javanese people who lived at Bangunsari. It is about monolingual and bilingual aspects that happen when Javanese people interacted in daily life. 2. Methods The design of this research was qualitative research in the form of ethnography approach. It was conducted at Bangunsari Village, Muna. The researcher focused on Javanese people who lived in an area of Muna regency in the village of Bangunsari and the researcher divided them into four domains to be analysed, namely family domain, neighbourhood domain, school domain, and mosque domain as well as divided into aspect of age. They were group of age 10-19 years old, 20-29 years old and 30-50 years old and above. There were seventeenth informants selected as the source of data in this research. Data source of this research was the spoken language used by Javanese people in their daily communication formal or informal situation that researcher got when observing. The researcher also interviewed informants that had been selected by researcher to obtain further or complete results. The data were collected by using some techniques; namely interview, and observation. In interview, the researcher asked some questions to the interviewee related to language maintenance situation for Javanese at Bangunsari. Furthermore, the researcher also did an observation to all Javanese there. The researcher had observed the informants’ condition and their daily activity by visiting their home one by one. To analyze the data in this research, the researcher used the following steps: a. Transliterated all recorded data into the written form. b. Identified and selected the data based on the researcher needs. c. Explained the analysis result about the language shift phenomenon in a community, and classified the cause factors which lead to the language maintenance d. Made a clear conclusion based on the finding data. 3. Result 3.1 Language Maintenance of Java Language at Bangunsari Bangunsari village is a village which is inhabited by several tribes including Javanese, Muna, and Makassar tribes. Of the three tribes, Javanese was the most dominanted. When we enter this village, we cannot distinguish between Javanese and non- Javanese because in general, the majority of the people there use Javanese as their daily language. As expressed by interviewee 1: (1) “...karena bahasa kita sehari-hari menggunakan bahasa Jawa...” “...because our daily language is using Java language...” (first respondent, 1 November 2018). From the first respondent statements’ above, it can be argued that Javanese people there use Java language in their daily life. Respondent 2 also reveal: 205 Journal of Teaching of English Vol. 6 No. 2 (June 2021) (2) “karena itu bahasa jawa bahasa kita sehari-hari..., ....sedangkan dengan yang suku Muna yang ada di desa Bangunsari pakai bahasa Jawa...” “Because Java language is our daily language..., ...whereas the Munanese tribe at Bangunsari uses Java language...”. (second respondent, 26 Oktober 2018) The respondent’s expressions above indicated that almost all Bangunsari villagers used Java language as their daily language including those who were not Javanese people like the second respondent’s wife which is Makasarnese. The use of bahasa is very rare except for certain people, namely those who cannot speak Javanese. As respondent 3 said: (3) “....kalau orang Muna yang bisa berbahasa Jawa ya kita gunakan bahasa Jawa. Kalau yang nggak bisa berbahasa Jawa ya kita gunakan bahasa Indonesia” “...if the Munanese people can speak Java language, we use Java language. If they cannot use Java language, so we use bahasa”. (Bakri/ third respondent, 2 November 2018). The third statement above indicated that some people from other ethnic groups had not been affected by the use of Java language so that they still used bahasa when interacting with people around them.