Indonesia has more than 700 languages, with Bahasa Indonesia (or simply Bahasa) being the official one. From the westernmost Sabang in Aceh to the easternmost Merauke in Papua, Indonesia is home to a wide variety of languages, placing it second only to Papua New Guinea in terms of linguistic diversity.
Bahasa has been effective for unifying diverse cultural and linguistic groups since it was declared in the Youth Pledge on October 28, 1928 during the fight for independence. But Indonesia also supports the rights of diverse groups to practise and develop their cultural values and traditions, including their local languages. Indonesian language policies allow the use of local languages alongside Bahasa in most domains, including education.
Personally, I can speak Balinese, Bahasa, Javanese, and English, plus I can understand bits of a few more local languages. My relatives, neighbours, colleagues – they all speak more than one language. Using different languages is a normal part of my day-to-day interactions. I haven’t met an Indonesian who’s truly monolingual – whether they be kids or adults. Even when someone speaks Bahasa, it's easy to tell where they're from or what ethnic group they belong to based on their choices of words, language structures, and/or accents.
But I’m aware of the fact that some local/indigenous languages are facing challenges related to language use and maintenance. It could be brought on by the dominance of Bahasa, filling more spaces in communication as more and more groups of different languages make contact with each other.
For example, most Lampung younger generations are hardly able to speak the Lampung language. The region of Lampung is home to other speech communities with different cultural and linguistic backgrounds such as Javanese, Sundanese, and Balinese. Some efforts – local government policies and regulations, Lampung language instruction, and linguistic documentation – have been made to maintain and preserve this language.
My background is in English language teaching, and I’m interested in working with Indonesian multilingualism in this space. From my professional experience, I know that English language teachers still have ambivalent perspectives on bi/multilingual language instruction – some of them have positive perceptions, while others don’t – despite the fact that in reality they make use of other languages as support in their classrooms.
I also know that students are hesitant to use English because they fear making grammatical mistakes and lack confidence. This might have to do with standards set by ‘native-speaker’ standards and the ‘rules of the game’ (cf The native speaker and the monolingual imagination).
There are various ways that harnessing Indonesian multilingualism can create learning opportunities. In education. we don’t necessarily need to look at languages as separate entities but rather as social practices that can be used for learning.
I’m currently investigating the processes involved in translating Indonesian languages into English in a higher education context. This is not limited to Bahasa; it includes Lampung, Balinese, and Javanese, three common languages among students in the Lampung region where I (normally) live. During the process of translating, I can see students using their language resources as a whole. This helps their English but also their language awareness and knowledge of the other languages.
I believe that all stakeholders – students, parents, teachers, researchers, and policy makers – need to work hand in hand to harness the (diverse) language resources available in the multilingual context of Indonesian education.