 Acquisition and Learning While acquisition is more likely to be subconscious, learning is a conscious where separate items from the language are studied and practiced in turn. The principal function of learnt language is to monitor what is coming from our acquired store to check that it is OK. Therefore, learnt language tends to ‘get in the way’ of acquired-language production and may inhibit spontaneous communication.

 Different Methods of Learning

Grammar Translation: is a conventional way of teaching; introduced the idea of presenting students with short grammar rules and word lists, and then translation exercises in which they had to make use of the same rules and words. Audio-lingualism: have the students to repeat and learn the language (structural and situational).

PPP (Presentation Practice Production): the teacher presents the context and situation for the language, explains and demonstrates the meaning and the form of the new language. The students then practice the language focus by doing some exercises covered four basic skills: writing, reading, speaking, listening. In the production stage, they are going to be in a less-strict tasks from the teacher; they can talk more freely about themselves or other people in real world.

Communicative Language Teaching: two main guiding principles; language is not just patterns of grammar with vocabulary items slotted in, but also involves language functions, and if the students get enough exposure to language and opportunities for language use, then language learning will take care of itself.

Task-Based Learning: is natural extension of communicative language teaching; the emphasis is on the task rather than the language.

 Elements for successful language learning (ESA)

Engage : get the student involved in the topic discussed. At this point, the teacher can do some elicitation or pre-lesson activities; games, small quiz, etc.

Study : the students are asked to focus on the construction of something, whether it is the language itself, the ways in which it is used or how it sounds or how it looks.

Activate : the students get a chance to try out real language use with little or no restriction—a kind of rehearsal for the real world. These three elements (ESA) can occur in a different order, depending on the main focus of the lesson.

Identitas kultural merupakan salah satu elemen penting dari diri suatu individu, karena hal tersebut membedakan dirinya dengan yang lain. Pada umumnya, secara sederhana dan konvensional, penentu identitas kultural adalah garis keturunan atau kewarganegaraan orang tua dan tempat lahir. Dengan demikian, apabila seseorang memiliki Ayah dan Ibu lahir dan berasal dari Italia, maka bisa diputuskan bahwa anaknya otomatis juga orang Italia, sesederhana itu. Namun, seiring dengan perkembangan dan perubahan sosial-budaya yang terjadi dalam masyarakat, faktor penentu identitas kultural pun juga berubah. Hal ini karena proses transfer dan transmisi budaya mengalami peningkatan yang amat drastis mulai dari abad ke 20, sehingga determinan identitas kultural seseorang pun juga berkembang. Dewasa ini, dunia dengan berbagai kompleksitas global menawarkan berbagai kemungkinan. Kini, suatu ras atau etnis tidak mutlak dimiliki golongan tertentu karena adanya amalgamasi atau perkawinan antar-ras atau antar-etnis yang memunculkan generasi baru yang familiar kita sebut sebagai anak-anak berdarah campuran atau ‘mix-blood’. Dengan adanya anak-anak berdarah campuran ini, maka tidak lagi mustahil bagi suatu individu untuk memiliki dua identitas kultural.   Selain itu, kondisi lintas batas juga memungkinkan individu-individu untuk bermigrasi dari satu negara ke negara lain yang memiliki perbedaan budaya. Sehingga, muncullah istilah penduduk ‘imigran’ yang akhirnya pun menetap di negara tersebut dalam jangka waktu yang panjang. Negara-negara yang dengan jumlah penduduk imigran yang besar di antaranya adalah Amerika Serikat dan Australia, sehingga kedua negara tersebut kerap kali disebut sebagai negara multikultural. Dengan demikian, seseorang bisa saja memiliki identitas kultural sebagai orang Amerika, tanpa secara genetik berasal dari keluarga Amerika asli. Sebagai contoh, muncul berbagai istilah sub-identitas Amerika yang dilatarbelakangi oleh etnis atau ras yang berbeda-beda seperti African-American, Mexican-American, atau Asian-American.

Identitas Kultural, Cerpen ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’, dan Giulia Giuffre

Dalam karyanya yang berjudul ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’, Giuffre menempatkan tokoh utama (yang merupakan dirinya sendiri) dalam sudut pandang orang pertama, sehingga, bisa disimpulkan dia memilih pendekatan yang lebih personal dalam melibatkan pembacanya. Pada awal cerita, disebutkan bahwa tokoh ‘I’ begitu iri dengan Ayahnya yang begitu yakin dengan identitas kulturalnya: “I envied my father his certainty about his cultural identity…” (p.91). Tokoh “I” yang merupakan warga Australia keturunan Italia mengalami kesulitan dalam mendefinisikan dirinya. Hal ini karena Ayahnya yang merupakan orang Italia memiliki epistemologi yang cukup mengenai negara asalnya karena pernah merasakan tinggal di sana dan mengikuti berbagai macam budayanya. Dengan demikian, walaupun tokoh Ayah sekarang telah menetap di Australia, memorinya yang kuat akan negara asalnya tidak mengurangu esensinya sebagai orang Italia. Sementara lain, tokoh Ibu dalam cerepen ini dideskripsikan sangat ‘Australia’, karena ia lahir dan besar di sana. Kondisi yang lebih kompleks pun muncul ketika tokoh ‘I’ dalam lingkup locale atau domain privat dibesarkan dengan nuansa Italia yang begitu kental, namun dalam lingkup spatial atau domain yang lebih publik dan terbuka, ia dihadapi dengan berbagai kompleksitas budaya dan mengurangi esensinya sebagai orang Italia secara genetik.

Semasa kecil, berdasarkan usaha orang tuanya untuk menanamkan nilai kebudayaan Italia kepada dirinya, ‘I’ dihadapi konsep bahwa budaya merupakan hal yang sangat lokal dan konkrit. Pada tahap ini, ‘I’ merasa tidak bermasalah dengan konsep tersebut, karena ruang gerak interaksinya juga masih terbatas dengan keluarga besarnya yang seluruhnya merupakan orang Italia. Dalam tahap ini, tokoh ‘I’ secara intensif terekspos berbagai rutinitas dan gaya hidup yang sangat ‘Italia’. Dengan demikian, ia pun menginterpretasikan orang Australia sebagai orang lain atau ‘other’ yang tentu saja sangat berbeda dari dirinya. Kesan yang dimiliki tokoh ‘I’ terhadap orang Australia yang dianggap orang asing ini merupakan kebalikan dari kesan yang ia miliki terhadap keluarga Italianya, yaitu dingin dan kaku. ‘It was ‘them’ and ‘us’—‘them’ being that cold, cool Anglo Saxon world out there’ (p. 93), begitu katanya. Dengan demikian, bisa disimpulkan bahwa tokoh ‘I’ mendefinisikan keluarga Italianya sebagai orang yang paling dekat dengannya, gravitasi identitas budayanya, serta zona nyamannnya. Ia menginterpretasikan orang Australia sebagai orang asing yang sangat berjarak dan berbeda dengannya, sehingga nampak mustahil untuk membangun suatu hubungan yang akrab.

Ketika tokoh ‘I’ beranjak dewasa, maka konsep ‘self’ atau ‘la famiglia’ dan others pun mengalami pergeseran. Hal ini karena ia telah berpindah dari interaksi yang bersifat locale menjadi interaksi yang bersifat spatial, sangat luas dan melibatkan berbagai macam orang dengan latar belakang diferensiasi sosial budaya yang berbeda. Ia sempat tinggal di Inggris, yang akhirnya berdasarkan pengalamannya, sifat dingin atau kaku yang selama ini ia pikirkan hanyalah sebatas stereotipe belaka karena pada akhirnya ia bisa menemukan kenyamanan dengan orang-orang Inggris: ‘…and living for a time in England that I realized that famiglia was not synonymous with trust, and that loving friendships could exist between unrelated people…’ (p. 93). Pada poin ini, tokoh ‘I’ telah memahami bahwa konsep ideal tidak hanya dimiliki oleh keluarganya atau famiglia, hal-hal positif pun bisa ia dapatkan dari golongan rasa tau masyarakat kultural lain. Hal ini pun meningkatkan respek tokoh ‘I’ terhadap kebudayaan orang-orang di tempat tinggalnya, Australia.

Selain itu, fakta bahwa pada satu sisi ia adalah orang Italia dan di sisi lain hidup dalam masyarakat Australia, membuat tokoh ‘I’ memiliki referensi ganda dalam mendeskripsikan dirinya, yaitu Italo-Australian. Karena tidak semua orang memiliki referensi ganda, maka hal ini pun bisa merupakan suatu keuntungan bagi yang memilikinya, karena secara otomatis pun mereka memiliki pengalaman budaya yang lebih kaya dan eksperimental.

Apabila dilihat secara keseluruhan, tokoh ‘I’ merupakan sosok yang sangat ‘multikultural’, sehingga memiliki toleransi budaya yang tinggi. Ia memahami segala perbedaan di sekitarnya karena melalui pengalaman hidupnya, ia menyadari bahwa perbedaan yang ada membuat segalanya menjadi bermakna. Menurut seorang tokoh kajian budaya, Stuart Hal  (1997: 234-235):

Difference matters because it is essential to meaning; without it,                              meaning could not exist. For example, we know what it is to be British, not only because of certain national characteristics, but also because we can mark its difference from its others. So here, difference signifies, it carries messages

Perbedaan inilah yang mendasari konsep multikulturalisme. Perbedaan merupakan elemen yang esensial dalam produksi bahasa dan budaya, identitas sosial, dan pembentukan karakter. Kehidupan multikulturalisme dilandasi oleh solidaritas yang kuat akan perbedaan untuk tercapainya integrasi sosial dan situasi kondusif suatu bangsa. Dalam era globalisasi, masing-masing negara cenderung memiliki kemungkinan yang kuat untuk menjadi bangsa yang multikultural karena meningkatnya interaksi antar budaya dan perkawinan campuran. Oleh karena itu, secara otomatis setiap bangsa akan belajar untuk memahami dan menghargai perbedaan. Maka, kemunculan atau penyebaran budaya lain bukanlah dianggap sebagai intruder ‘pengganggu’, namun sebagai penguat identitas masing-masing, karena dengan adanya variabel (kebudayaan) lainlah, kebudayaan kita menjadi lebih kuat dan berkarakter.

Jika disimpulkan, teori identitas multikultural yang dipaparkan oleh Hall menggarisbawahi pentingnya karakter distingtif yang ada pada kebudayaan kita untuk menjadi suatu paramater tersendiri yang membedakan kita dengan kebudayaan lain. Pada konteks cerpen Giuffre, orang Itali bisa terdefinisi karena adanya ‘others’ seperti orang Australia, Amerika, China, atau yang lainnya. Kehadiran “mereka” atau “others” sebagai pembanding yang berbeda menjadi penting memahami siapakah “familigia” atau “self“.

Simpulan

Melalui perkembangan cerita, tokoh ‘I’ pada akhirnya mempertanyakan definisi dirinya sendiri…”How am I Italian? How Am I Australian?” Pada poin ini, ia merasa lebih nyaman dengan sebutan orang Australia. Sepanjang masa kanak-kanak hingga dewasa, ia terekspos oleh kebudayaan dan gaya hidup Australia, ia merasa menyatu dengan orang-orang Australia. Sementara, ia mengakui dirinya sebagai imigran Italia, namun bisa dibilang bahwa ia tidak tahu apa-apa tentang Italia. Lingkungan hidupnya membuat ia lebih familiar dengan kebudayaan Australia. Di satu sisi, sebagai masyarakat multikultural, identitasnya sebagai imigran Italia tetap ada. Dengan demikian, dapat disimpulkan bahwa konstruksi identitas kultural tokoh ‘I’ dibentuk dari hegemoni, yaitu dominasi atau pengaruh kebudayaan lain dalam lingkungannya. Warisan budaya dan faktor genetika ternyata tidak begitu dominan atau kuat dalam mengkonstruksi identitasnya sebagai orang Italia, lingkungan hidupnya lah yang berperan signifikan. Absennya pengetahuan serta pengalaman nyata mengenai Italia membuat esensinya sebagai orang Italia berkurang, sementara keterlibatan nyata dirinya dalam pergaulan orang-orang Australia membuat dirinya lebih familiar dengan kebudayaannya.

Sosok imigran dalam masyarakat multikultural seperti Australia memang tidak terlepas dari negara asalnya, sehingga stereotipe masih diatribusikan kepada imigran-imigran di Australia. Tetapi, seiring dengan perubahan tempat tinggal dan lingkungan pergaulan, para imigran pun mulai terlepas dari masa lalunya di negara asal mereka dan membentuk identitas baru mereka sebagai warga pendatang di Australia. Terlebih lagi pada imigran generasi kedua seperti tokoh ‘I’ yang memiliki deskripsi Italia di imajinasinya saja atau sebatas lingkungan locale yaitu famiglia. Para generasi kedua ini mulai membangun atau mengkonstruksikan dirinya sebagai orang Australia secara berbudaya dalam domain spatial atau publik, dan menempatkan Italia sebagai identitas yang diwariskan oleh orang tua mereka dalam domain privat. Dengan demikian, dapat disimpulkan bahwa kondisi lintas batas menyebabkan warisan budaya atau faktor genetika tidak lagi menjadi satu-satunya penentu identitas kultural seseorang. Kompleksitas global yang melibatkan proses transfer, rekonsumsi, dan transmisi budaya memungkinkan seseorang untuk berpindah tempat dan mengalami berbagai macam budaya sehingga memberikan identitas kultural baru bagi dirinya.

References:

Giuffre, G. (1992). Who Do You Think You Are. In K. Herne, Who Do You Think You Are: Secon Generation Immigrant Women in Australia. Sydney: Women’s Redress Press.

Hall, S. (1997). The Spectacle of Other. In S. Hall, Representation: Cultural Representation and Signifying Practices (pp. 234-235). London: Thousan Oaks.

Walwicz, Ania, Hammial, P. Et.al. “Travel/Writing”. Angus & Robertson, Australia: 1989

People who are not given chances, people who are not taken into account in our state budget revenue and expenditure, and people who do not receive their rights as citizen –yet, they are people with the biggest hope, determination, and optimism to leave everything in their beloved homes, and face the fear-provoking completely strange world – these might be the perfect description for our modern feminine heroes, the Indonesian Domestic Female Workers.

Living in underdeveloped areas in Indonesia, these women are faced with more dilemmatic complexity of their lives and predicament. Severe poverty has turned the nine-year-compulsory education and university as a dark aerodynamic for them. They do not even know that education can be their undeniably powerful instrument to get better lives and jobs in the future. With minimum touch with education, they live in an unknowingness of feminism, equal rights, and emancipation.

Contextually speaking, they no longer have time to get promising long term quality of life like education or proposing political policies for their betterment. Their minds are full of nagging thoughts of how they are going to survive with enough foods in a day, how to get their children fed, and how to fulfill a lot of household chores adequately. Not surprisingly, these necessities are considered to be more pressing rather than to think about getting to college, or fight for women’s right.

Simplistically, their basic role as women is to support their husband and families to make a living, with strictly limited skills and education. At this point, an opportunity comes from the female domestic workers recruitment agencies coming to their villages. They give the female villagers an alternative path to get wealthy and happy lives for their families—to work overseas as domestic workers or housemaids with a highly considerable salaries. They describe that working abroad will give them bigger chances of what their country has failed to provide them all this time. In other words, they are urged to leave their countries, families, and homes for works, and they will come back with abundance of money to build an adequate and proper house for their families, to earn costs for their children’s education, and overtime, to have better quality of life.

Hudah at the Domestic Worker's Shelter in Condet

This is exactly what happened to one of our female domestic workers, Masudah binti Abdullah (32), affectionally called as “Hudah”, during her life. Through a heart-melting and interesting interview conducted in 30^th May 2011, Hudah gave us a crystal clear description about the real experiences of Indonesian women working as domestic helpers abroad. That day, she looked good and healthy wearing black flowery dress and had her hair pony-tailed. Her face was always embellished with smiles and friendliness that people will be surprise if they know that this young woman has made through a lot of hardships, struggles, and predicament throughout her life. When being asked about why she chose to be a female domestic worker overseas, she assuredly answered “to chase my dreams of having wealthier and happier lives for my family”. This simple but exceedingly encouraging answer was her only reason to survive all predicaments and threats she would face in foreign countries in the next story.

Nonetheless, before telling us about her unforgettable experiences abroad, Hudah narrated her childhood in Jember, Jawa Timur, her beloved homeland. Hudah succeeded to finish her elementary school, and she described she was living in a poor but harmonious family. Nevertheless, her problem began when her parents tell her to stop going to junior high school, and get into an arranged marriage. The parents’ intention was splendid, though, that was to get her beloved daughter a financial security for the rest of her lives effortlessly. They did not want to see Hudah living in an economically poor life for longer period of time, thus, they thought that to have Hudah married to a man in a possession of good fortune and economic standing would be the best solution. However, as she found out that the man she was going to marry was not a morally good man who screwed other girls in his spare time, Hudah refused her parents’ offer and insisted to work outside home. “I believe that to earn money was much more important than to get married early, I was only sixteen and that time”, explained Hudah. Even so, her parents did not agree with Hudah at that time, they insisted to get Hudah another arranged married with different man. At that time, they believe that to have her get married was the best decision they could have done to their daughter. Nevertheless, Hudah still believed that she did not need to get married, and she was able to make a good living for her family without hands of a man.

Overtime, Hudah did not end up with arranged marriage, but her family’s financial condition got worse day by day. As the oldest child in her family, Hudah began to think to get a highly paid job and protect their family from more difficult financial problem. Nevertheless, with minimum education and limited access to employment, she found it was hard to get job inside her village. Accordingly, the situation was also the same when she tried to seek job outside her village and went to several big cities in Jawa Timur. With minimum bargaining power and negotiating skills, she failed to compete with other job seekers who were happened to have better qualifications than her.

During her confusion and dilemma, she found a recruitment agency near the town, and got to know about being domestic workers abroad. The agent showed her the benefits and promising salaries that she could get. Without longer consideration, she finally registered herself and being sent to Jakarta to take trainings and preparation before she go abroad. “At first, my parents were angry with me and insisted me to stay home, they were scared that something bad will happen to me as the television news tell us about violence and sexual abuse done to our female domestic workers”, said Hudah.  Nevertheless, she finally succeeded to assure their parents that everything would be okay and she would survive abroad. Correspondingly, Hudah moved to Jakarta in the beginning of 1997 and was accommodated in domestic workers temporary shelter in one of agencies in Condet, Jakarta Timur. At this shelter, she was trained to do household chores very well, for example how to take care of babies, how to make a bed, how to wash clothes properly, and many more. Not only that, she was also provisioned with foreign languages skills such as Arabic and English.

No more than a month, Hudah was sent to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and worked there with a nice Syrian family. “They always treated me well and provided me proper place to sleep, gave me enough foods, and allowed me to keep in contact with my family in Indonesia”, she said. Nevertheless, living with good family did not make her life in Saudi Arabia free from weary and difficulty. In fact, her wonderful dreams about life in foreign countries had turned into nightmare. “I was culturally shocked, Arabian culture was poles apart with Indonesian’s, my movement as female was much more strictly limited, and there were a lot of new regulations which made me confused. Furthermore, even I was equipped with foreign language skills before, I could hardly use it in daily conversational practice, I could not say anything and that made my masters and I difficult to understand each other”, explained Hudah. Not surprisingly, at that time Hudah started to miss her home and yearned to return home anytime soon. However, she needed to stay because of the legalized contract and the masters insisted her to stay. “My only reason to survive there is my family, I need to survive for them and make them happy when I come home with a successful news”, said Hudah determinedly. With a lot of patience and optimism, Hudah had finally finished her service after three years, and returned home. As it was predicted, the money acquired from the job succeeded her to build a huge home for her family and got their little brother and sister better education. At this point, Hudah felt that all of her hardships and struggles abroad were paid back in return by seeing their family happy.

Hoping that the next trip to the different designated country would also give goodness for her, Hudah was sent to Oman to work as a domestic helper for the second time. Although she fortunately lived with a good family again, Hudah began to feel another problem in Middle Eastern country; sexual harassment. With an exceedingly oppressed sexual desires tied by conventional Islamic law, Hudah realized that some Arabic men were taken control by devil’s thought when they found appealing women. “This is completely unusual for me, at a time,  I walked through a street near my masters’ house to buy some goods when I forgot to wear facial veil, and suddenly a stranger threw me cans of soft drinks and  began to tease me verbally with improper sexual-related words”, explained Hudah. Besides, she also got news that her colleagues were sent back to Indonesia because she escaped from her masters as she was sexually and physically abused by the male members of the family.

Despite the problems she had faced in Oman, after three years she was transferred to Jordania because of her good track records. In Jordania, unfortunately she was faced with disagreeable stingy Jordanian masters. Besides not being paid regularly, she was also restricted and not allowed to keep in contact with her family in Indonesia. It took five years of agony and weariness for Hudah to get away from this family. “Although I never received any physical or sexual violence from them, the fact that I was not paid for any single penny really hurt me. I worked for nothing, and five years were just a waste of time”, explained this woman, who was once dreaming to become a policewoman, very sadly.

Hudah and her friends, Indonesia's Feminine Heroes; Domestic Workers

Nowadays, she lives in the domestic workers’ shelter in Condet, and she contemplated of whether she would work again overseas or just stay with her family in Indonesia. “It takes a lot of courage for me to go back, and I need to prepare myself with higher assurance and optimism”, said Hudah. The story of Hudah is only a tiny piece of huge puzzles of complicated problems of our domestic women workers. They might leave their homeland full of hopes and aspirations, but when being faced with the real condition, they struggled very hard to survive the shock of the cold of foreign world which brazen them out. Now, I believe it is the time for us and our government to reconsider the continual lives of these women. Concerning the problems aroused, I believe it is better to have our women to work and get their successful lives inside our beloved country. Putting them in dangerous risks of foreign world should no longer be our option. To start with, giving them access and obtainable education will be our very perfect first step. As Nelson Mandela –the famous African leader— asserted, “education is the greatest weapon you can use to change life, to change destiny, to a better future”.

References:

Anggraeni, D. (2006). Dreamseekers: Indonesian Women as Domestic Workers in Asia. Jakarta: Equinox Publishing Indonesia.

Djajanegara, S. (2010). Peran Wanita di Negara Maju dan Negara Berkembang. Bahasa, Sastra, dan Wanita , 109-115.

Jurnal Perempuan. (2008). Perempuan dan Anak di Wilayah Tertinggal. Jurnal Perempuan .

The fact that women were not allowed to get formal education even worsened this condition. It confined them in an endless circle of women inferiority. They were in the state of unknowingness, the darkness of gender discrimination, and the absence of knowledge. At this point, Kartini accused for equal opportunity. She refused the social doctrine “kodrat wanita” or women destiny that caused women to remain in the lowest social stratification. During her seclusion, she used her ability to communicate in Dutch language by corresponding with a Dutch woman named Rosa Abendano, who opened her broader access to European knowledge regarding women emancipation and feminist thinking. The letters written were compiled and published into a legendary book entitled “Habis Gelap, Terbitlah Terang”, or Out of Dark, Comes Light seven years after Kartini passed away. In her life, although eventually ended up with polygamy and inevitable arranged marriage, Kartini succeeded to establish school for women and inspired many people and institution to build more schools and education institution for women. Nowadays, the situation is poles apart. Indonesian women are now in a state of enjoying and benefiting what Kartini prominently struggled for in the past.

Contextually speaking, we are now living in a post-feminism era where women have their positions in public domains and equal right in terms of economy, politic, education, and social. Many believe that the country has succeeded to provide broader access for women to achieve high social standings in the society. There are a lot of female doctors, educators, police, and career women participating in developing the country and building Indonesian community. We once had a female president, Megawati Soekarno Putri, in 2001-2004, which has been perceived as the highest achievement ever had by Indonesian women. As it was stated by Nila Rahma, an outstanding student of Faculty of Humanities University of Indonesia on a brief interview conducted at April 16 2011, discrimination among women in terms of equality in education has gradually disappeared. According to this young woman, who was once a head of cultural research and study of Students’ Executive Board of Faculty of Humanities, women’s freedom nowadays is largely supported by the emergence of sophisticated information and communication technology. “I believe Indonesian women nowadays have wider access to express their ideas and opinions. Women, especially those who put big interest in writings and public-related field such as politics or laws, have greater opportunity to distribute their ideas in television and printed media such as newspapers and magazines. Even ordinary women can take chances to represent their ideas in larger social context. Take Facebook and Twitter as examples. Through these two virtual medias, everyone can express their ideas and opinions”, said Nila. At this point, she contrasted the situation between women in Kartini’s time and women in the current context. That is to say, Nila considered that the complexity of global context in contemporary lives has benefited women recently. “Not only it gives broader entrée to freedom of expressing opinions, but also eases their business and career lives. For example, busy housewives who also contribute as translators or editors in public domain can do their jobs from homes and send the results via email. They visit their office only when urgently needed, and they still have their households remain handled”, explained Nila, who once held the fourth place (Juara Harapan I) in Outstanding University Student Award of Faculty of Humanities University of Indonesia 2010. Nonetheless, Kartini still remains as appreciably inspiring female figure for modern Indonesian women. When being asked about what personal features of Kartini that Indonesian women must have, Nila enthusiastically answered, “the importance of being critical, far-seeing, thoughtful, and brave in facing reality. Kartini thought one step further from any other women in her era, so must us. We should not take everything for granted, we must dig deeper and analyze something beyond social phenomena, and never afraid to speak out the truth and disagreeable experience”. From Nila’s perspective and experience, we can conclude that the condition of women in current context is much better than women in the colonial time. Generally speaking, women emancipation has gone well and social equality between men and women has been achieved at this time. Nevertheless, this general conclusion is not entirely true. Some people argue that although women empowerment has become general pattern in the society, especially urban society, there are a lot of specific social deprivation and discrimination subjected to Indonesian women nowadays. At this point, academicians have the most reasonable opinion to be considered. Based on an intriguing interview on Friday, 15th of April 2011, Ikhaputri Widiantini, S.Hum., M.Si., who is affectionally called as Mbak Upi, revealed several aspects of continuing women discrimination in contemporary context. Firstly, in political context, although Indonesian women have been acknowledged as a legal citizen, they are not posited as “subjects”. Accordingly, there is a great tendency for the government to place women as “objects” for the country. As it was asserted by Mbak Upi, who is now a manager of research and education of Yayasan Jurnal Perempuan in Jakarta, there are several constitutions and regulations which are discriminative for women that are still conducted this moment. For instance, constitutions on pornography, regional constitutions on curfew for women, and absence of additional allowance for women workers are clearly unfair for women. Moreover, the construction of health-related policies both from central and regional governments often does not consider women’s experience, especially on their sexual reproduction organs. “The decision of whether the women should undertake abortion or not and health warranty often do not involve women’s experience in the process. Besides, although it is true that there are a lot of female doctors in the field, they still have masculine perspectives in doing her jobs”, she explained. This situation even continues in labor field. At this point, Mbak Upi pointed out that the components of labor’s salary are much more prioritized for men than women. “The males are given extra money for buying cigarettes and other shirts. On the other hand, there is no extra money for women to buy their sanitary napkins and female underwear. Can you imagine? They choose to give money for cigarettes rather than for woman’s sanitary napkins!”, stated Mbak Upi, who is also a lecturer on Paradigm of Feminism for the Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Humanities University of Indonesia. On further explanation, this founder of Komunitas Ungu stated that, in terms of quantity, we may achieve something significant like thousands of women go to college, political institutions, business domain, and so on. Nevertheless, in terms of quality, there are several tasks queuing to be solved. “The guarantee of women’s right has hardly been actualized, and on its implementation, a lot of people misinterpret “equal” to be similar with “same” in terms of women’s emancipation. The biological consideration has never been taken into account in job-related policy. For example, prohibition of marriage conducted by several companies. At this point, women are forced not to get married until five years of works. This is simply unfair, since fertile period of women is between 20-35 years. Above that, delivering babies will take greater risks. Postponing marriages will result in women getting married at risky time phase on delivering babies”, said Mbak Upi. Furthermore, woman-related problems are often underestimated by the central government like unfinished solving for domestic violence towards TKW (term for Indonesian woman worker overseas). Conclusively, women’s struggles do not stop until equality in education achieved, but as a revolutionary woman like Kartini, we need to realize that discrimination can permeate into various forms, including in constitution deformity and unfairness in employment. Contextual and time dimension differences do not necessarily differentiate us from Kartini. “It does not mean that we stop fighting for women’s liberty. Whatever the context we are in, spirit to eliminate discriminative social boundaries should still exist”, stated Mbak Upi.

Jump to another brief interview at 14th of April 2011, this time it was done with a male student, Bernard Amadeus Jaya, the champion of Outstanding University Student Award of Faculty of Humanities University of Indonesia 2011. According to him, women are now faced with cultural values that symbolically place them as second sex. “For example, the tradition of Javanese nuptial ceremony, which obliges women to wash their husbands’ feet as a symbol of obedience, degrade their values as a mere human being”, stated Bernard. This may not sound significant, but there will be great tendency to practice that perception in real life. In Bernard’s point of view, if equal treatment is to be achieved, every little thing that degrades women’s position in the society including traditional symbols need to be terminated. At this point, Javanese society has several traditional aspects to be reconstructed in order to suit with gender fairness.

To conclude this enthralling discussion regarding Kartini and women empowerment in Indonesia, we need to go beyond the surface. Social discrimination can pervade into specific aspects of life, not only limited to education as in Kartini’s era. As it stated on one article in the Jakarta Post (Yulianto, 2010: pars 25-29), for the sake of future generations, we need to open another page of women’s aspiration which initiates their consciousness to alter the destiny of women who are still politically, culturally, and socially subordinated by the state and social construction. Although many believe that the increasing women’s participation in public domains imply that patriarchal power and feudal social order had somewhat lost its absolute authority, a lot of discriminations to women still happened, and it is our duty to solve them.

Reference: Yulianto, V. I. (2010, April 21). Is Celebrating Kartini’s Day Still Relevant Today? Retrieved April 15, 2011, from thejakartapost.com.

            Those are the prevailing three words defined the contestants of world-wide beauty pageants such as Miss Universe and Miss World. Historically, this type of contests, especially Miss Universe, have been popularized in 50s, and in 70s, it has been internationally and officially recognized as it was broadcasted world-widely via television satellite for the very first time (The History of Pageants: 1970s, 1998: par 1). Accordingly, this contest has turned into a hugely profitable business as it is watched by billions of people all over the world and sponsored by mega-giant companies. Formerly, Miss Universe contest was actually derived from a local bathing competition in 1952. The contest was fronted by Catalina Swimwear in Long Beach which emphasized the swimsuit session of the competition (Miss Universe Pageant: History, 2010: par 1). Thus, as it promoted swimwear, it mainly highlighted the visual beauty of women, especially the flawless body which was often described as thin, fair-skinned, and perfectly-rounded bosoms and curved hips. Later on, the requirements for the contestants shifted from only focusing on bodily-aesthetic beauty to three integrated ideal beauty components consisting of high intelligence, well-mannered performance, and proportional physical figure. These requirements are popularized through the legendary slogan “Three B: Beauty, Brain, Behavior” that successfully constructs the concept of ideal women in the society. Subsequently, these contests have transformed into the most expected international annual tradition with countless young women all over the world  vying to be the next Miss Universe or Miss World (Miss Universe Pageant: History, 2010: par 2). Generally, people believe that the presence of contemporary beauty pageants is to elevate the quality of women and give them bigger chance and access to change the world as they will have a lot of social, humanity, and cultural tasks after winning this competition. Nevertheless, this belief is not entirely true. In fact, for several reasons, the contemporary beauty pageants like Miss Universe and Miss World are proven to have more adverse impacts to the society, especially women.

Firstly, the commercial aspect of these beauty pageants indicates that this kind of program exploits women as commodities to gain financial profit. As we know, the sponsors of beauty pageants almost always happen to be world-wide companies of which branches and retails spread all over the world. The type of products they sell varies, but most of them are fashion, cosmetics, and beauty products. For example, Miss Universe is sponsored by DNL Jewelries, Chinese Laundry Footwear, Sherri Hill Fashion Line, Farouk Hair Products, and many more (Miss Universe: Sponsors, 2010). For the companies, Miss Universe is a great tool to promote their products world-widely as they are used and worn by the beautiful contestants. Moreover, Miss World has launched its very own beauty products branded as “Miss World”. The products sold consist of make-up, body and hair care, and clothing and its retails have spread in 115 countries all over the world (Miss World: Products, 2010). Likewise, the winners of Miss Universe usually become certain product’s ambassador such as You C 1000 and Avon Cosmetics. In other words, the popularity of the show is used for spreading the promotion of the companies’ products. Besides, the beautiful figures of the contestants are functioned to reaffirm the quality of products as if the products are really efficacious. Subsequently, the women become the commodities to fulfill the companies’ desires and financial profits.

Secondly, while the well-known purpose of these contests is to give bigger chances and fairness for women in making significant contribution to the world through social activities, it is argued that beauty contests can actually create social unfairness, especially among women. This notion is strongly related to the prerequisite of Miss Universe or Miss World that is strictly limited to particular kind of women. Although the slogan is beauty, brain, and behavior, physical beauty is persistently the most important element of this competition. Evidence shows that almost all contestants have unbelievably gorgeous looks and it is rarely proven that each of the contestants have achieved academic or significant social success when they join the competition. Furthermore, the swimsuit session, evening gown session, and the pattern of the show which condition the contestants to pose and walk as if they were runway models are proofs of how these competitions are still spotlighting physical beauty. Since physical beauty is not owned by every girl all over the world, Miss Universe and Miss World clearly narrow down their targeted female candidates. As a result, it is perceived that only the beautiful are the winners and able to take chances while the ugly are the losers. This condition is obviously unfair for women as the pageants place physical beauty as the best women’s achievement and the most important fulfillment. Scientifically speaking, the making of physical beauty is very unpredictable and only involves chromosomes and biological components. That is to say, it is acquired naturally and hardly determined by the person herself and cannot be posited as one’s life achievement. Achievement is a result of hard works and determination, while to have a beautiful figure does not need any hard effort. In addition, philosophically speaking, beauty is hardly connected or influential to reality or social phenomena. As a part of aesthetics, it has often been seen as a sphere that has very little to do with real life, and more to do with mere decoration and the perplexing existence of connoisseurs (Lechte, 2003: 25).  Thus, women, if they want to contribute in social or humanity works, do not have anything to do with looks or appearances.

Thirdly, with their over billion audiences, Miss Universe and Miss World are one of influential medias in constructing images to the society. As it is previously mentioned, emphasis on physical beauty is consistently present in these competitions. Thus, extendedly, the ideal depiction and representation of women in this kind of competition will create a superficial paradigm of true beauty. Mass media exposures and related advertisements even reinforce the existence and power of these pageants. Unfortunately, it is generally known that most of us like to reckon of ourselves as resistant to the power of mass media in influencing society’s perspective and creating images and values within the society and underestimate the adverse consequences of the media exposure (Killbourne, p.455). In respond to this misperception, there is a reasonable explanation of how media can alter society’s social construction includes women and physical beauty. In contemporary context, as it is promoted through beauty pageants, physical appearance as a sign of personal or group well-being and achievement is a meticulously monitored and conscious affair for women, especially who put big interest in beauty pageants. The body as object becomes the highly refined machine whose completeness should never be in doubt. Accordingly, once it cannot be fulfilled, there will be an immediate response to a condition of social threat or loss (Merleau-Ponty 1962:80–81) (Friedman, 1994: 115-116). As a result, believe it or not, emphasis on physical beauty, specifically in beauty pageants, can actually bring more pressure to women to pay extra attention to their observable body attributes. That is to say, “females learn to be more concerned with observable body attributes rather than focusing on non-observable body attributes such as feelings and internal bodily states[1]” (Greening, 2010: pars 3-4). Therefore, it creates appearance anxiety and self-consciousness among women which often lead to several deviations such as the constant increase of women’s struggles with dieting and eating disorders, women who are obsessed to do plastic surgery in order to acquire their preferred physical appearances, and women who are just being ignorant to their human values besides physical beauty such as intelligence, virtue, and personality (Women in Advertising, 2010: pars 1-2). As it is stated by Frederickson et al in the journal “That Swimsuit Becomes You: Sex Differences in Self-Objectification, Restrained Eating, and Math Performance”, women will ascertain that their bodies and faces are in need of modification, escalation, and disguise to fulfill the standards of beauty in beauty pageants that will even burden their lives (Greening, 2010: pars 1-2).

To conclude, apart from what is generally perceived in people’s mind, beauty pageants are actually a powerful tool to manipulate women all over the world both at conscious and unconscious level. From the explanation above, exploitative aspect of beauty pageants seems to be problematic for women, and as an influential image creator, beauty pageant has been an artificial standard for women beauty in general. Regarding these reasons, the practice of current beauty pageants should be reconsidered and contemplated. The choices are either to stop completely the continuation of this competition, or redesign the concept of this contest to be fairer and more appropriate for women in general.

References:

Friedman, J. (1994). Consumption and Identity. Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers.

Greening, K. D. (n.d.). The Objectification and Dismemberment of Women in the Media. Retrieved November 22, 2010, from http://www.kon.org/urc/v5/greening.html

Killbourne, J. “Two Ways a Woman Can Get Hurt”: Advertising and Violence. In R. C. Gary Colombo (Ed.), Rereading America: Cultural Contexts for Critical Reading and Writing (pp. 455-476). Boston and NY: Bedfort/St. Martin’s.

Lechte, J. (2003). Key Contemporary Concepts. Lodon: SAGE Publications.

Miss Universe Pageant: History. (2010). Retrieved April 8, 2011, from missuniverse.com: http://www.missuniverse.com/info/history

Miss Universe: Sponsors. (2010). Retrieved April 8, 2011, from missuniverse.com: missuniverse.com/charities/sponsors

Miss World: Products. (2010). Retrieved April 8, 2011, from missworld.com: http://www.missworld.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=696&Itemid=137&lang=en

The History of Pageants: 1970s. (1998). Retrieved April 8, 2011, from pageantcenter.com: http://pageantcenter.com/history-70s.html

Najwa Sungkar: A Move and An Action to Get One Step Closer

“Do first, think later”, these golden words seem to be the precise summary depicting the overall figure of a twenty-first young lady, Najwa Abdullah Sungkar, as she enthusiastically quoted in the middle of our conversation last Tuesday, March, 01 2011. That statement might sound controversial for most people, but Sungkar has her best way to decode it into a well-printed sheet of concepts.

Dreaming to be an excellent news anchor in the future, Sungkar has demonstrated an incredible passion in journalism. For her, it is a dynamic, challenging, and skillful work which conform her character. In accordance with, this profession will also develop her personality since she is required to be objective, brave, confident, and mature. News anchors stand up as a passion which completes her seeking for satisfaction while it reversely enhances self qualification of her as an individual.

Holding position as a reporter in her campus organization, Sungkar shows a strong commitment to her profession. She carries on responsibilities and integrity. The responsibilities include self improvement in many aspects. “Journalists or news anchors are those who consume a lot of knowledge and information and have high skepticism towards the validation of them. Thus, a news anchor could maintain her/his critical thinking and objectivity,” she said. Integrity takes into account a strong dedication and determination to uphold the truth upon everything. She believes that both aspects are the fundamental assets for a high-qualified journalist. Without responsibility and integrity, a news-digging profession would only contain a meaningless notion.

Troubles always come to follow during her experience being a reporter. However, Sungkar always shifts her focus on trouble to be a challenge of life. She maintains a professional figure. For example, she was assigned to do news coverage on Sandy Sandoro’s album launching once heavy rain and stuck train came to hit. Despite of those threats, she was determined to finish her duty without being paid for a single penny.

“It has become my prominent compass that people should do first and think later. If you keep your fear, you procrastinate to discover something. It means that you just pile things up without knowing what might wait you ahead. Troubles and difficulties are the best exercises to produce a well-trained people,” she said.

Sungkar has been registered as a English Studies student in University of Indonesia and been currently sitting in her third year class. She has become a reporter for a campus radio in this university called RTC UI for the last two years during which she has achieved quite excellent track record in her news coverage. Besides internal events in University of Indonesia, she has interviewed some popular public figures such as Cinta Laura, The Changcuters, The Groove, and so forth.

To accomplish her life time career as a news anchor, she actively joins several journalistic training and seminars. She is also the active members of ISAFIS, Indonesian Student Association for International Studies, in which she holds on position of news letter editor. It helps her to develop reporting skill, to extend networking, and to enlarge insight view and knowledge.

As she idolizes Najwa Shihab, a Metro TV news anchor, her ideal picture of future is to work with that TV station. After graduating from university, she intends to apply for news production team there. She hopes that it could be such a stepping stone to achieve her eternal wish to be a news anchor.

“Hardship and pain would never cease to exist. I believe that failure, defeat, and frustration are parts of human’s life so that there is no use to avoid them. Do first, think later. You would get one step closer to what you have dreamt and earn much more than what you expected,” she said in the closing of our conversation.

for further Peny’s works, visit: penyrahmadhani.wordpress.com

“That’s why God creates love, so all the differences can be unified” – cin(T)a the movie

The lines above are quoted from a heart-rending and mind-blowing contemporary Indonesian movie entitled cin(T)a (2009) directed by Sammaria Simanjuntak. Set in college life, this film mainly highlighted one of the most sensitive and pressing issues in Indonesia: the social and legal justification of amorous relationships between a man and a woman with distinct religious background. Generally, this first Indonesian film discussing religion issues focused on how Indonesian society’s normative boundaries and religious and traditional values are still strongly implemented in everyday’s lives, including in what makes a marriage legal and socially accepted. Furthermore, one point that significantly affects the option of choosing a lifetime companion is a dogma that says either woman or man can only marry a man or a woman from the same religious cluster. This dogma extends to all religions in Indonesia, including Catholic, Christian, Islam, Buddha, and Hindu. Thus, the law of marriages in Indonesia is designed to conform it. Law No. 1/1974 which restricts interreligious unions, is asserting that a marriage is only legal when it is conducted according to one religion, which supports the stance of adversaries of interfaith marriage (The Jakarta Post: Interfaith marriage remains sensitive issue 2010, p.1). Actually, there is one basic reason of how the majority of Indonesian people are still stuck to this construction, even in a contemporary context. That one basic reason is religious heritage. Most of the people feel guilty about a conjecture that there will be a great tendency for them to terminate their religious inheritance to their off-springs by the time they marry a person of a different religion. That is to say, having a demise of a certain religion in a nuclear family is the implication of interfaith marriage (Schwartz 2006, pars. 3-4). However, if we relate this phenomenon to our current contemporary social structure and issues, this is not entirely true and conforms the real condition of our society. In fact, concerning several aspects of multicultural life in Indonesia, interfaith marriages should be legalized and justified

First things first, in line with multicultural context in Indonesia, reciprocal social interaction between people with various religious and ethnic backgrounds takes place, either it is in work places, pedagogical institution, or social organizations. Thus, romantic interference leading to marriage is inevitable between men and women in this “meeting by chance” situation. Unfortunately, the legalization of marriage between two people with different faiths has never been actualized in Indonesia’s marriage laws. Therefore, interfaith couples find it difficult to be officially accepted in the society. They either mandate to end their relationship and find a spouse from the same religious cluster or get married overseas to obtain official justification if they want to survive their relationships. In terms of its effectiveness and efficiency, this condition is simply inadequate and fails to fulfill our social necessity. While religion is a private matter, supposedly the state authority does not have a right to interfere. Moreover, as we live in a diverse and multicultural society, our attitudes to faith change. There must be an increase of religious solidarity to establish healthy interpersonal relationships within the society, including in nuptial concerns. There is an obligation for the government to suit its regulation with the social need, including permitting interfaith marriage. The nuptial prohibition will only cause more distant religious gap and suffering for the couples, which is inversely proportional to Pancasila’s third clause; the unity of Indonesia, and fifth clause; a social fairness for entire citizens of Indonesia.

Secondly, the prohibition of interfaith marriages clearly contravenes human rights, both at international and national level. As an exceedingly rudimentary right and international instrument[1], it is compulsory to implement human rights concretely, including in constructing national nuptial constitution. Therefore, interfaith marriages should be widely acknowledged by the state government as a right to every citizen. Moreover, since the amendment of UUD 1945, the position of human rights has been crucial in Indonesia. This is reflected trough the construction of human rights regulation into one specific chapter in our constitution. Besides, there are also TAP MPR No. XVII/MPR/1998 and law No. 39 year 1939 that provide a strong stance for honoring human rights in Indonesia (Bhakti 2007, pars 18-25).

Last but not least, interfaith marriages can and do work successfully. In fact, multi-religion family can even develop stronger respect and consideration in honoring other people religion. The statement that marrying a person with different religious background can automatically cause the diminishing of respective religious values is not entirely true. In fact, interfaith marriages are based on strong mutual respect for religion diversity (Dr. Dilip Amin, p.4). This is because from the prenuptial preparation, ideally, the spouse should take into account their religious differences deeply if they want their marriage to succeed more than anyone else. Moreover, through interfaith marriages, the children reared in this family will learn a lot about religions, and discover their own path to one specific religion when they decide which religion they want to choose when they are adults. That is to say, religious transparency and freedom of choosing one specific religion is actualized in this family.

To conclude, to fit in reality, interfaith marriages should be legalized and justified in Indonesia. This is to reduce religious distance and establish religious tolerance society in our country. Having many legal interfaith marriages will bridge more supportive environment for religious diversity and can actually produce closeness between people with different faiths. Prohibiting interfaith marriages will only cause unfairness for some couples and increase religious tension and distance inside multi-religion society.

References:

Bhakti. PERKAWINAN BEDA-AGAMA DARI ASPEK HAK ASASI MANUSIA. 30 May 2007. 11 March 2011 <bh4kt1.multiply.com>.

Dr. Dilip Amin, Ph. D. “Interfaith Marriages:What Young Dharmists Should Know.” (n.d.): 4.

Schwartz, Allan. The Emotional Challenges of Interfaith Marriage. 12 December 2006. 11 March 2011 <www.psychcentral.com>.

The Jakarta Post: Interfaith marriage remains sensitive issue. 10 March 2011. 10 March 2011 <http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2005/04/24/interfaith-marriage-remains-sensitive-issue.html>.

English Teaching as Exceedingly Lucrative Enterprise Around The World

The quotation above taken from the book “Linguistic Imperialism” by Robert Phillipson implies the superiority of English as a tool of global communication and an instrument to get educationally high social standing in a global society. Nevertheless, the book also said that as an unqualified generalization, this statement is flagrantly fallacious regarding there are many millions of highly erudite people in the world who are happily and quite justifiably ignorant of English (Phillipson). However, I would say that this second statement is not enitrely true. In fact, the industry of English teaching has been always a promising business all around the world.

Previously speaking, having proliferated under variable circumstances to assorted regions of the world prevailingly through “the joint outcome of Britain’s colonial expansion and the more recent activity of the US” (Graddol 1997: 9), English formerly and currently benefits from international acknowledgement and vitality. At this point, Crystal (1997: 139) perceives that “there has never been a language so widely spread or spoken by so many people as English. Therefore, there are no precedents to help us see what happens to a language when it achieves genuine world status” (Anchimbe). In accordance with this phenomenon, as the occurrence of advanced communication technologies permit freedom of transferring information and ideas, the usefulness of an international language or lingua franca just like English is highly needed in order to facilitate an effective trans-cultural, cross-cultural, and world-wide communication and spread of information. Therefore, in order to be globally and informatively literate, a good English proficiency is inextricably required. Here, the English Language Teaching (ELT) industry has currently become a major cross-cultural, trans-cultural, and world-wide enterprise in order to fulfill the demand of people who want to improve their English proficiency to survive in this highly informatively and communicatively literate global society. That is to say, when distance now does not necessarily matter, with the vanishing of national boundaries, and the precedence of regional and transnational economies, the prospects for widespread of primary lingua francas—English—have immensely increased (Anchimbe). As a result, as English becomes a linguistically constant gravitation for the world, the ELT enterprise has been a timeless and die-hard pedagogical enterprise.

Tenet Two: The Ideal Teacher of English is a Native Speaker—A Deep Analysis

It is generally known that most of the people believe that English native speakers will make ideal English teachers in ELT, both at English as A Foreign Language (EFL) and English as A Second Language (ESL). It is perceived that ‘at the outset it was the native speakers who were taken for granted as the automatic best teacher, and all other teachers looked up to the native speakers’ (Strevens, interview) (Phillipson). In reality, this belief is reflected through several examples. Firstly, in Indonesia itself, having English native speakers as the teachers in one’s English course institution is usually projected as a commercial instrument to attract English learners. There are many English course institutions emphasizing their native-speaker teachers in their advertisements, which imply that this is a very special feature that distinct them from any other English course institutions. Not only that, it is also used as a source of gaining more income for the institution. English course taught by native speakers differs in fee, which is relatively more expensive. That is to say, it posits in a higher position than any English course taught by non-native speakers.

Concerning all of the phenomena mentioned above, we have come up to one simple question: what is the underlying reason of these people thinking that native speakers will automatically make the most ideal teachers of English? I might say that the answer is strongly related to the power of originality.

What makes people more attracted to native speakers is their originality. Regarding their originality, the major assurance behind the native speakers is that they can at anytime provide valid and steady judgment on their own language. They are capable of detecting false grammatical expressions in their own language regardless of whether they can explain exactly why they are ill-formed (Chomsky, 1965) (Anchimbe). If we analyze why presumably native speaker is rudimentarily better qualified than non-native in teaching English, it is associated with original and inherited English comprehension. They have greater facility in demonstrating fluent, idiomatically appropriate language, the ‘received pronunciation’ (RP), in appreciating the cultural connotations of the language, and in being the final arbiter of the acceptability of any given samples of the language (Phillipson). Furthermore, it is generally considered that excellent proficiency in English is strongly determined by excellence in speaking. Therefore, by having not only good English fluency but also perfect pronunciation, thus native speakers are more preferred by English learners.

What You See Ain’t What You Are Getting

However, as it is mentioned by Phillipson, regardless of those beliefs, this tenet has no scientific validity. ELT actually warns against over-reliance on the native speakers. ‘A teacher is not adequately qualified to teach a language merely because it is their mother tongue’ warns the UNESCO monograph on the use of the vernacular languages in education (UNESCO 1953: 69). This report was also assembled by experts in bilingualism and foreign language teaching. In the European foreign language tradition, the best teacher has near-native-speaker competence in the foreign language, and comes from the same linguistic and cultural background as the learners. Thus, in this case, non-native speakers can also make a good model of English teacher with their obtained English competence.

Furthermore, another thing that doubts this tenet is related to the standardization of English language taught and used in teaching. With the native speakers without professional English teaching background, there is no standard. While the native speakers may be deemed ideal for ELT, it is far from saying they are free from fallacy. This is because “most native speakers of English in the world are native speakers of some nonstandard variety of the language” (Trudgill 1998: 35, see also Mufwene 1997) (Anchimbe).

As it is believed by Hocking (1974), the writer of “All what I was taught and other mistakes: a handbook of common mistakes in English”, being a native speaker is no guarantee for excellent competence in communication. Communication itself is far more dormant that the words used in the process. This is because in the case of teacher and learner who have different cultural background, there will be an inevitable cultural distance in the communication. That is to say, there is a large infrastructure of social and cultural components that determine what must be said and how it should be said. Not only that, from a grammatical perspective, even in native domains, poor and inefficient speakers are still found. Error analysis in linguistic study did not emerge from the study of non-native speakers, but from the study of native speakers. Pettman (1913), the writer of Afrikanderisms, in a statement on the use of English by fellow Britons in South Africa lament: “It gives an Englishman, who loves the sentence that is lucid and logical, a shock to hear his native tongue maltreated by those who are just as English as himself (qtd Görlach 1995 :19). Therefore, any ELT exertion that is mainly based on native-speaker origins without solid ELT training is not safe from error-free language transmission.

Furthermore, we also need to consider the issue of correctness regarding the rules of the language. Language is so complex that being a native speaker does not automatically succeed one as a proficient speaker. There are some several factors determining this; language revolution or change, dialect variations, socio-cultural contexts, professional backgrounds, cultural variations and so forth. Thus, in ELT, which we have known that it currently has moved far-fetched from the borders of the UK, the US, and Australia and with the emergence of several regional norms of the language, the socio-cultural component is really crucial (Anchimbe).

The Role of Non-Native English Teachers

As we see nowadays, English is not only restricted to the language itself, but it is related to the use and communication. It involves geographical and socio-cultural context as there are a lot of various “Englishes” that are far beyond the borders of English speaking countries. Thus, learning English with people who are culturally and geographically fitted-in is more appropriate for the learners. Having native teachers with different cultural background will create cultural distance which can impede the absorption of English knowledge. Universal norms of English teaching, therefore,(as in the UK or US) can no longer be applied in global ELT. For most people and most purposes, national or local intelligibility should be the target of ELT (Kachru1986a: Chapter) (Phillipson). Conclusively, what at the highest stake of ELT efficiency and effectiveness is the language and teaching comprehension and cultural adjustment of the teachers. That is to say, to be fluent and excellent in English, we do not necessarily need to have native speakers as our teachers. In fact, with appropriate skills and comprehension, non-native teacher can be much better.

References:

Anchimbe, Eric A. “The native-speaker fever in English language teaching (ELT):Pitting pedagogical competence against historical origin.” 2006. http://www.linguistik-online.de. 29 December 2010 <http://www.linguistik-online.de/26_06/anchimbe.pdf>.

Burchfield. Linguistic Imperialism. Ed. Robert Philipson. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.

Mahboob, Ahmar. “Beyond the Native Speaker in TESOL.” Linguistik online (2006): 63.

Phillipson, Robert. Linguistic Imperialism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.

The measurements mentioned above prove that the notion of happiness is strongly related to desires, pleasures, expectations, other people, and of course, the existence of evidences to the contrary. Nevertheless, in this modern and virtual world, most of us still reckon of ourselves to be in a state of happiness when we are financially secured and able to buy things we want. Therefore, often the quest of our illusory regarding happiness is equated with the gain of profits and incomes, and the accumulation of ever increasing amount of money (timarr, 2010). Unfortunately, this perception is not entirely true. In fact, there are a lot of cases of people with abundance of wealth but poor in the feeling of contentment. Take an easy example, who does not know the extremely popular Pop princess, Britney Spears? From the surface, we suppose to think that she must be happy and content. By possessing billions of money, she can buy everything she wants. With her popularity, we always reckon that everybody likes her. However, as we have seen in media exposure, Britney often got her life problematic and chaos. Her distress regarding her divorce and unhappy relationships has made her to suffer from psychological ailments causing her to be in a long-term psychological therapy and rehabilitation. The paparazzi even worsen her life by making her private life has become public consumption and underestimation. By considering this, does anyone still think she is absolutely happy? I believe the answer would be no.

For stronger example, we can see researches conducted to scrutinize the connection between happiness and richness. Daniel Kahneman in his research working paper in 2006 entitled “Would You Be Happier If You Were Richer?” stated that most people believe that they would be happier if they were richer, but survey evidence on subjective well-beings is largely incoherent with that belief. Surveys in many countries accomplished over decades show that, on average, reported global verdicts of happiness have not changed much over the last four decades, in spite of large increases in real income per capita. Moreover, it is stated that increases in income have been found to have only a transitory effect on individuals’ reported life satisfaction or happiness.

So, what actually happiness is? In what occasion we can be happy and content? In life, we sometimes see how simple things can make people happy. For example, in a financially poor family, the family members themselves rarely feel discontent with it. In fact, they can still smile whole-heartedly overtime and having harmonious relationships. More surprisingly, they reckon themselves to be so blessed and consider not need to have abundance of more money to live their current life. For them, life is satisfying enough when they have each other to face life.

To conclude, happiness is relative. Our internal condition and attitudes toward life are the main determinants. Too often, we always associate happiness to have things we can not have at the moment and leave ourselves in yearning and wondering. Too often, we associate life satisfactory with possession of a great deal of money, popularity, and titles. Too often, we suspend our happiness with other people and forget to think about the goodness of ourselves. Starting from now, take a deeper consideration. Start to be grateful of things you already have, because too many times, people does realize what they actually have when its gone. By being grateful, you will feel contented and even more motivated to live life to the fullest. If you eventually can not decide to be happy, make other people happy. This too, can work for you because happiness can be contagious. By realizing how meaningful you are to someone, you will be happy in the end. Finally, as it is quoted from Margaret Lee Runbeck, in life, happiness is not a station you arrive at, but a manner of traveling. Stop thinking that we only can be happy if we have accomplished our goals of life. Life is about process, because you will understand life from it and figure out yourself.

Dalam konteks Barat, khususnya Amerika Serikat, Julia Kristeva mengkategorikan tiga fase feminis; Feminisme Liberal yang memperjuangkan kesetaraan hak, fase Feminisme Radikal yang menolak tatanan simbolik yang didominasi pria demi mengukuhkan perbedaan itu sendiri, dan fase Feminis Ketiga yang menggoyahkan dikotomi antara maskulin dan feminin. Ketiga fase ini mempengaruhi bidang sastra yang dapat dikelompokkan atas sumbangan pemikirnya dari latar belakang budaya dan negara yang berbeda, seperti feminism Amerika, Inggris, dan Prancis yang memiliki “warna” yang distingtif. Pendekatan feminis dari masing-masing negara itupun sangat majemuk baik dalam metode maupun penekanan, dengan mengambil landasan teori sastra dari New Criticism, strukturalisme, psikoanalisis, dan teori-teori post-struktural, termasuk post-kolonial. Pada intinya, pendekatan feminis merupakan suatu kritik ideologis atas perspektif yang mengalienasi masalah ketimpangan dan ketidak-adilan dalam pemberian peran dan identitas sosial berdasarkan perbedaan jenis kelamin.

Konsep Dasar:

1. Gender dan Jenis Kelamin

Secara umum gender dapat didefinisikan sebagai pembedaan-pembedaan yang bersifat sosial yang dikenakan atas perbedaan-perbedaan biologis yang ada antara jenis-jenis kelamin. Jadi, bisa dilihat di sini dikotomi gender merupakan sebuah konstruksi sosial.

2. Esensialisme dan Konstruksi Sosial

Terkait dengan poin pertama, perspektif tersebut otomatis bertentangan dengan esensialisme; cara berpikir yang mengaitkan segala sifat-sifat yang ada pada suatu hal dengan esensi atau hakikat yang secara absolut ada pada diri hal tersebut. Esensialisme menganggap bahwa bahwa ada suatu sifat-sifat yang melekat pada hakikat diri perempuan maupun laki-laki secara umum. Perspekif esensialis terlihat dalam penggunaan istilah “kodrat” atau “takdir” yang seringkali dipakai dalam diskursi normatif (agama, moral-etika) untuk memberikan pembenaraan yang dianggap sacral dan tidak dapat diganggu gugat atas pembedaan-pembedaan yang sebetulnya merupakan konstruksi sosial.

3. Patriarki dan Falogosentrisme

Patriarki didefinisikan sebagai sistem yang melalui berbagai macam tatanan sosial, ekonomi, dan politik memberikan prioritas dan kekuasaan bagi laki-laki. Falosentrisme didefinisikan sebagai kecendrungan memakai sudut pandang lakilaki sebagai referensi untuk memandang kehidupan dan mendefinisikan segala sesuatu. Dicetuskan oleh Jacques Derrida, falogosentrisme adalah gabungan dari falosentrisme dan logosentrisme (ideology yang memprioritaskan kestabilan makna didukung oleh rasionalitas manusia dan penekanan bahasa lisan). Jadi, falogosentrisme adalah pola pikiran dan bahasa dalam sistem patriarki.

4. Wacana, Representasi, dan Resistensi

Wacana, sebagai medium untuk menyuarakan dan mengaktualisasikan pengetahuan, secara langsung atau tidak langsung menghasilkan kekuasaan beserta resistensinya. Dalam kaitannya dengan wacana inilah, para feminis memberikan penekanan terhadap peran berbagai produk budaya lainnya dengan melakukan “representasi” atau konstruksi imaji-imaji atau pengemasan fakta dalam bentuk visual dan verbal, yang menyiratkan makna dan ideology tertentu. Kajian-kajian feminis menyorot bagaimana media masaa mengkonstruksi berbagai stereotype tentang perempuan sekaligus mempelajari bagaimana teks-teks tertentu melakukan resistensi terhadap ideology falosentris yang dominan.

5. Feminisme, Pendekatan Ras/Gender, dan Postkolonial

Penekanan terhadap masalah konstruksi identitas dalam teori post-kolonial banyak memberikan inspirasi kepada para feminis untuk melihat hibridisasi konstruksi ras/etnisitas dengan permasalahan gender. Hal ini bisa dilihat melalui adanya isu gender yang bervariasi di beberapa wilayah yang berbeda, seperti perempuan di negara dunia ketiga. Di satu pihak, sebagai wilayah yang dijajah oleh Barat, perempuan mengalami penindasan yang paling berat karena ia menjadi objek seksual eksotis dari Barat, dan di sisi lain mengalami penindasan dan mendapatkan kedudukan subordinatif oleh “laki-laki” dalam sistem patriarki bangsanya sendiri. Pendekatan feminis post-kolonial menyorot permasalahan ini dari berbagai arah dan sudut pandang, termasuk persoalan subjektifitas dan identitas budaya yang kompleks.

6. Penerapan: Kritik Feminis atas Pembacaan Dominan

Salah satu pendekatan yang sering dilakukan oleh kajian feminis adalah melakukan “pembacaan ulang” terhadap teks-teks yang selama ini telah diberi makna dalam kerangka pikiran falosentris. Pembacaan ulang ini bisa mendekonstruksi ideologi falosentris (seksisme) dalam teks, atau menunjukkan perlawanan yang tersembunyu di balik teks itu.

Sumber:

Budianta, Melani. (2002 ). Pendekatan Feminis Terhadap Wacana: Sebuah Pengantar. In I. D. Aminuddin, Analisis Wacana: Dari Linguistik Sampai Dekonstruksi (pp. 199-217). Yogyakarta: Kanal.