Use of Indonesian language

Use of Indonesian language

From Gatra

It is undeniable that foreign words are flooding the Indonesian vocabulary. Many are adopted and become Indonesian words. But in the meantime strenuous efforts are being made to maintain and to respect the Indonesian language. This is understandable: every nation wants to defend its language.

Some people use foreign words for prestige, while others feel they lack Indonesian equivalents for certain foreign terms. Foreign words are also used for the sake of international uniformity; for example, in the banking and insurance sectors.

I would like to make some points and suggestions:

* We have been using foreign words for decades and this fact cannot be totally changed. We have adopted, from Dutch, certain words to name parts of a bicycle, like setang, ban, sadel, rem, ketengkas, etc. The Indonesian word for a jack, dongkrak, comes from the Dutch expression domme kracht.

* The Center for Language Development should establish a clear-cut policy concerning the areas that require the use of Indonesian words. At present, only real estate developments and tourism have been targeted by the drive to use Indonesian words. The promotion of Indonesian should cover all areas. We have become too familiar with the expressions "service station", "one hour photo lab", "food center", "department store", "supermarket", and so on.

* Indonesian words are usually longer than foreign ones. We have wisatawan mancanegara to describe foreign tourists, for example. Many foreign words have only one or two syllables. It is time the language experts thought of finding words with fewer syllables, which are easy to remember, for their foreign equivalents.

* When used as proper names there should be no need to change foreign words. For example, "Citraland", "Landmark Center" and "Hero Supermarket".

* The use of acronyms should be limited.

* Many Indonesian words came too late to take the place of foreign words, such as "hi-tech", "hard disk", "CD-ROM" and so on.

* In view of the process of globalization, we need to retain words like "homestay", "laundry", "bell-boy", "concierge" and "guest house".

I suggest that the movement to promote the use of the Indonesian language be conceptual and consistent; rather than just a lukewarm project.

* Do not hesitate to use words already adopted, like desain, atensi, properti, komoditi and manajemen. Similarly, kantri klab (English: "country club") can be used without hesitation. To change it into kumpulan kampung would be unpopular.

PAUL I ZACHARIA

Malang, East Java