Bahasa Indonesia: The pride of Indonesians

Bahasa Indonesia: The pride of Indonesians

Veeramalla Anjaiah, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

For Bobby Kuntoro, 23, a student of social sciences at Sebelas
Maret University in Solo, Central Java, it has always been a
dilemma about what language to use in and outside of his house.

"I have been using equally Bahasa Indonesia and Bahasa Jawa
since my childhood. I use Bahasa Indonesia when outdoors and
Bahasa Jawa when indoors. I must be careful while talking to my
mother, who is a Javanese and is not fluent in Bahasa Indonesia,"
Bobby said.

Bobby is one of millions of Indonesians who use Bahasa
Indonesia and regional languages in their everyday lives. Both
the languages, national and regional, have so far maintained
their identity but there is a potential danger that the dominance
of Bahasa Indonesia among the younger generation could harm
regional languages in coming decades.

Since its birth as a nation, one of the most remarkable
achievements of Indonesia has been the development of Bahasa
Indonesia as its national as well as official language.

From Sabang to Merauke, Bahasa, or Indonesian -- as it is
popularly known -- is widely spoken as a first or second language
by almost all 220 million Indonesians. Beyond Indonesia's
borders, Bahasa is now also spoken by a majority of people in the
youngest nation, East Timor.

Indonesia is perhaps the only country in the world that solved
its language issue long before it even became independent. It was
not an easy task to select a national language from more than 400
languages and dialects.

Seventy-six years ago, on Oct. 28, brushing aside their
regional, cultural, linguistic and ethnic divisions, 750 young
men and women from all corners of the archipelago gathered during
the Second Youth Congress in Jakarta and took the important Youth
Pledge.

The youth clearly stated in their pledge that there would be
"one homeland (Indonesia), one nation and one language (Bahasa
Indonesia)."

Many people -- both Indonesians as well as foreigners -- may
not be aware that the term "Indonesia" did not exist before 1850.
It was first used by a British anthropologist, James Richardson,
to refer to the archipelago located between the two continents of
Asia and Australia.

As far as Bahasa Indonesia is concerned, in 1928 Indonesian
people chose Bahasa Melayu, a language spoken in Riau, Sumatra,
as their national language under the new name Bahasa Indonesia.

One may wonder why Indonesians selected Bahasa Melayu, a
language spoken by only 10 percent of the population at that time
instead of Bahasa Jawa, which was spoken by about 40 percent of
the population.

"It was due to the tolerance of the Javanese people, who
wholeheartedly supported Bahasa Indonesia as the national
language for the sake of national unity.

This aspect was the key to Indonesia's success in solving the
language problem," said Dr. B.D. Arora, an Indian expert on
Indonesian affairs.

During the colonial period, the Dutch banned the usage of
words like "independence" and "freedom" in public meetings.
Bahasa Indonesia was the symbol of persatuan (national unity).
Indonesian nationalists cleverly used the word persatuan as a
synonym for the word "independence".

But there was another dimension to the adoption of Bahasa
Melayu, which was the lingua franca of the archipelago.

"It (Bahasa Melayu) had been used as a language of trade since
ancient times and came to be known primarily as Melayu Pasar
(Malay bazaar) language," Rustanto Sudin, the language editor of
Matra magazine said.

He said that apart from Indonesia, Bahasa Melayu is widely
spoken by the people of southern Thailand, Mindanao in the
Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Singapore.

While explaining the reason for the selection of Bahasa
Melayu, the late Sutan Takdir Alisjahbana, a literary and
cultural figure, said: "It was the simplicity and structure of
Bahasa Melayu that made it easy to learn. Moreover, there is no
hierarchy in Bahasa Melayu, unlike in Bahasa Jawa, which has
different levels such as Krama Inggil, Krama and Ngoko, making it
difficult to learn."

Bahasa Indonesia is unique in that it is a more democratic and
flexible language than any other language in Southeast Asia. It
had interacted with many languages, including Sanskrit, Arabic,
Chinese, Tamil, Telugu, Dutch, Portuguese and English.

Since its birth, Bahasa Indonesia gave momentum to the
embryonic concept of Indonesian nationalism and united an
enormous country that is extremely diverse, not only
geographically and ethnically, but also religiously and
culturally.

"Bahasa Indonesia is the pride of the nation," Prof. Harimurti
Kridalaksana, a leading language expert from the University of
Indonesia, proclaimed in one of his books.