D I GLOS S I A I N LARANTUKA, F LO R E S : A ST UDY ABOUT LAN G UA G E U S E

A N D LANG UAGE SW I TCH I NG AMON G T H E LARANTUKA COMMUN I TY

Threes Y . K umani reng

In many speech communities two or more varieties of the same language are used by some speakers under different conditions . The most fami liar examp le is , perhaps , the standard language and the regional dialect . People speak the local dialect at home or among fami ly or friends of the same dialect area but use the standard language in communicating with speakers of other dialects , on public occas ions or when talking in a mixed group (Ferguson 19 59 : 1) .

To ordinary people , the standard language is that varie ty of speech which is spoken by the high-class people , the intellectuals , the social climbers and the pedants . The standard language serves in social and educational identi fication of individuals . It is an indispensable requirement in the achievement of social and economic status .

The standard language , as the linguis t takes it to mean , is much more than a status language or a language which re flects uni formity in pronunciation . According to Einar Haugen , the standard language is that variety of speech which reflects uni formity in form and function (Haugen 1972 : 2 5 1 ) .

The dialect , to the linguist , is any habitual variety of language , regional or social (McDavid 1969 : 99 ) , any form of speech , rural or urban , high or low in the hie rarchy of social classification . It is the variety of speech closest to the individual , that always forms a rich source for the supply of words to describe various kinds of emotions and attributes (Asmah Haj i Omar 19 7 1 : 3 ) .

The Malay language in Indonesia , which will as we ll be cal led standard Bahasa Indonesia , is spoken di fferently in various dialects . Those different dialects then become the native tongues of some ethnic groups , such as in Ambon , in Kupang , in Larantuka and in some other places . People speak these dialectal varie tie s of Malay be sides Bahasa Indonesia , in different situations .

The purpose of thi s paper is to des cribe a diglossic situation in the Larantuka community where people speak Bahasa Indonesia on formal occas ions and Larantuka Malay in informal , ordinary conversational and friendly situations . The writer will also show features that characterise diglossia such as the function , prestige , grammar and phonology of the two varieties .

Amran Halim, Lois Carrington and S . A . Wurm , eds Papers from the Th ird Interna tional Conference on Austronesian Linguistics , vol . 3 : Accent on vari ety, 131-136 . Paci fic Linguisti cs , C-76 , 19 82 . © Threes Y . Kumanireng 131

Kumanireng, T.Y. "Diglossia in Larantuka, Flores: a study about language use and language switching among the Larantuka community". In Halim, A., Carrington, L. and Wurm, S.A. editors, Papers from the Third International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics, Vol. 3: Accent on variety. C-76:131-136. Pacific Linguistics, The Australian National University, 1982. DOI:10.15144/PL-C76.131 ©1982 Pacific Linguistics and/or the author(s). Online edition licensed 2015 CC BY-SA 4.0, with permission of PL. A sealang.net/CRCL initiative.

132 THREES Y. KUMANIRENG

The j udgements of this paper are based primari ly on the writer ' s personal experience , as she herse l f is a native speaker of Larantuka Malay . She spoke Larantuka Malay ( in her chi ldhood days) at home , spoke the regional language ( Lamaholot) with people outside Larantuka and spoke Bahasa Indonesia with her teachers or schoolmate s at school .

Larantuka Malay is spoken by about ten thousand people living in Larantuka , the most important town in the eas ternmost part of the is land of Flores . This dialectal Malay has a long tradition as an interethnic means of communication , but is the first language only of the coast and a few up-country pockets . People living outside Larantuka speak tlleir own regional language ; when they come into contact with the Larantukan they speak Malay . The Larantuka Malay is known as Me layu Rendah to contrast with Melayu Tinggi which is now Bahasa Indones i a .

Be fore Bahasa Indonesia gained its present status a s the National Language , this dialectal Malay was considered the standard dialect in this region . The status of this dialectal Malay was a dominant factor in the acquisition of status and prestige . It was one of the requirements of j ob-seekers in the society , and it had a strong e ffect on the surrounding rural area. The Malay-speaking people are also called ' Orang Melayu ' , and they consider themse lves urban or educated as this Malay gives them a feeling of prestige .

This dialectal Malay is used in everyday communication in matters which are in formal , non-academi c and non-professional in nature . When villagers of di f ferent backgrounds meet each other in the marke tplace , or when they haggle with a trader from the neighbouring i slands they rarely resort to Bahasa Indonesia. A Larantuka man , for instance , might feel uncomfortable or appear to be the sub j ect of ridicule , i f he is obliged to use Bahasa Indones ia when he is having a heated argument with his wife , be she a Larantuka or a non-Larantuka woman , or when he is convers ing with any of his companions of the same dialectal community as himself .

Bahasa Indonesia , on the other hand , is used in matters which are academic , phi losophical and professional in nature as we ll as in literary writing . Bahasa Indonesia is the language of education and powe r , superposed and considered superior to the dialectal Malay . No Larantukan can become educated without learning Bahasa Indonesia and by Indonesian standards the average educational level in Larantuka is quite high .

For convenience of re ference we take Charles Ferguson ' s term for the super­posed variety in diglos sia as H (High ) , for Bahasa Indonesia , and L ( Low) , for Larantuka Malay . There is specialisation of function for High and Low . In one set of situations only H is appropriate , and in another only L ; with the two sets overlapping only very slightly . The fol lowing is a list of situations with indication of the variety normally used .

- Personal letters - Ins tructions to se rvants , waiters , or workme n - Conversation with fami ly , friends colleagues - Instructions in class/offices - Sermons in church or Mosque - Speech in parliament - Pol itical speeches - School lectures

Bahasa Indonesia (H)

X

X X X X X

- Newspapers : editorials , news-storie s , captions for pictures X - Folk literature , folk songs etc . - Poetry X

Larantuka Malay (L)

X X

X

DIGLOSSIA IN LARANTUKA , FLORES 133

The importance of using the right variety in the right situation can hardly be ove restimated . A non-Larantukan who learns to speak fluent and accurate Malay , and then uses it in formal speech , is an obj ect of ridicule . A member of the speech community who uses Bahasa Indones ia in a purely conversational situation or in an informal activity ( like shopping) is equally an obj ect of ridicule . Bahasa Indonesia is not used as the medium of ordinary conversation ; and any attempt to do this marks one to be either pedantic and arti ficial or else in some sense dis loyal to the community .

There are some poems composed in dialectal Malay , known as panto ( pa n t un in Bahasa Indonesia) . A small handful of poets compose in both Bahasa Indonesia and Malay , but the s tatus of the two kinds of poetry is very di f ferent . For the speech community as a whole it is only the poetry in H (Bahasa Indonesia) that is fe lt to be ' real ' poetry . Folk Ii terature , folk songs and tales are in L ( Larantuka Malay) form. There are also certain proverbs , politeness formulas and the like in L whi ch are cited in ordinary conversations . The following is an example :

" Ub i kao- kao , ub i ban to a p i Dudo j ao - j ao , j an gan t a ro a t i "

" Ikan ma t a kene , ganto ujong ba l e Angka ma t a ken a , a t i b u l a - b a l e " etc .

Among speakers , adults use Malay in speaking to children and children use Malay in spe aking to one another . This dialectal Malay is learned by children in what may be regarded as the normal way of learning one ' s mother tongue . Bahasa Indonesia may be heard by chi ldren from time to time , but the actual learning of it is chie fly accomplished by the me ans of formal education . The speaker is at home in L to a degree he almost never achieves in Bahasa Indonesia ( H ) . The grammatical structure of Malay is learned without explicit discuss ion of grammati­cal concepts ; the grammar of H is learned in terms of ' rules ' and ' norms ' to be imitated. By contrast , descriptive and normative studies of dialectal Malay are either non-exis tent or relatively recent and small in quantity . There is no settled orthography and there is a wide variation in pronunciation , grammar and vocabulary .

The grammatical structure of Malay is simpler than that of Bahasa Indonesia . There is no special or established norm for grammar . Complex sentences which result from the combination of two or more simple sentences either by the process of embedding or con j oining are hardly used in dialectal speech . A sentence like : Me reka 5 udah perg i is said Do rang so p i in Larantuka Malay . Indones ian words , pronunciation , and morphological patterns are freely used in the Larantuka context , especially by people who live in the city . Affixation of verbs is completely absent in dialectal Malay .

Generally speaking , the bulk of vocabulary items of Bahasa Indonesia is shared by Malay , of course , with variations in form and with differences in use and meaning . Bahasa Indonesia includes in its total lexicon technical terms and learned express ions which have no regular Malay equivalents , s ince the subj ects involved are rarely if ever discussed in pure Malay . Larantuka Malay includes in its total lexicon popular expressions and the names of very homely obj ects or obj ects of very localised distribution which have no regular Bahasa Indones ia equivalents s ince the subj ects involved are rarely if ever dis cussed in pure Bahasa Indonesia ; for example rumpu- rampe , in Larantuka Malay , cannot be replaced by any single word in Bahasa Indonesia ( c f . gado- gado ) .

The lexicon of Larantuka Malay is taken from Malay , Bahasa Indones ia , Portugue s e , Dutch and the regional language ( Lamaholot) . The vocabulary of this

134 THREES Y. KUMANIRENG

dialectal Malay i s greatly influenced by Portuguese and Dutch , and this can s ti ll be obse rved in church services . The Portuguese and the Malaccans from the Malay Peninsula carne and settled in Larantuka in the beginning of the seventeenth century . The descendants of the Portuguese can still be met in the city . The Larantukans have inherited such Portuguese names as de Roxari , da Silva , Diaz Vie ra , Fernandez and others . The adopted items then undergo changes in spelling , pronunciation and sometimes in meaning , due to selection by the speakers themselves of a system of express ions for the purpose of intergroup communication . The following are some examples of adopted vocabulary from different languages .

Larantuka Malay Dutch Bahasa Indones ia Om Oom Paman uncle tan ta t a n te b i b i aunt me ( mo ) me t dengan with ne ne t i dak not

Larantuka Malay Portuguese Bahasa Indonesia renya re i nha ratu queen kanta can t a re nyany i sing nyora s i nho ra pe rempuan woman TuaN Deo Deo Tuhan God

Larantuka Malay Larnaholot Bahasa Indonesia We l a We l ak men u s uk den gan t a l i to s tab

sampa i temb us un tuk d i i kat

O l uN O l ung percuma free, gratis O r i N O r i ng pon dok small house b r i k i N ( b e r i k i N ) be r i k i n g mengangkat to take up/to lift

Larantuka Malay Bahasa Indonesia mak a N makan eat m i noN m i n um drink te l o te l u r egg s i po s i pu t snai l p i pe rg i go terada/te t i dak not ae a i r water so s udah already ambe amb i 1 take rube rubuh col lapse g a re ga r i s line bae ba i k good tako takut afraid mampo mampus to die maso masuk to enter b uke b uk i t hi l l gunoN gunung mountain 1 i a 1 i h a t to see en gko engkau you k u ro ku rus thin etc .

--�-�-----------------------------------

DIGLOSSIA IN LARANTUKA , FLORES l35

There are many paired items ; one Bahasa Indonesia and one Malay referring to fairly common concepts frequently used in both Bahasa Indonesia and Malay , where the range of meaning of the two terms is roughly the same and the use of one or the other immediately stamps the utterance or written sequence as H {Bahasa Indonesia or L (Larantuka Malay ) . The words : ben tak to suspect , puk u l to beat , bagus kind, bohong falsehood, and t i dak not for example never occur in ordinary conversation , and kebeka to snap , beda to beat , noka beautifu l , pe rega to lie and te rada not are not used in normal written Indones ian or in formal speech . The re is a great gap between the corresponding doublets in this diglossia .

The relationship between the phonology of Larantuka Malay and that of Bahasa Indonesia in diglossia is quite close . The sound sys tems of Larantuka Malay and of Bahasa Indonesia are very much simi lar . The speake rs use mixed forms , and there is extensive interference in both directions in terms of the distribution of phonemes in specifi c lexical items . Larantuka Malay has a special kind of nasal sound ( in final position) which i s , here , symbolised [ N ] . It is not the e m ] , e n ] or [ Q ] of Bahasa Indones ia , but is , let us say , a nasal ised vowe l ; m i n um in Bahasa Indone sia is said /minoN/ in Larantuka Malay ; datang is pronounced /dataN/ , and makan is said /makaN/ etc .

Diglossia in Larantuka is accepted and not regarded as a ' problem ' by the speech community . The dialectal Malay i s adapted as an effective means of communication in informal situations . I t is preferred as it is closer to the real thinking and fee ling of the people of all levels ; it causes no educational problems s ince people have already acquired a basic knowledge of it in early chi ldhood .

For broader communication among different regional and social segments of the community , e . g . for economi c , administrative , mi litary or ideological reasons people use Bahasa Indonesia . The diglossia situation in Larantuka may remain stable for long period of time . Larantuka Malay continuously borrows new vocabu­lary items from Bahasa Indonesia . People would prefer to use ' mixed language ' rathe r than to abandon Malay complete ly . They read news written in Bahasa Indonesia and discuss it in Malay . They listen to formal speeches de livered in Bahasa Indonesia and give comments in Larantuka Malay using Bahasa Indonesia now and the n .

The maj ority of Larantuka Malay speake rs are to some extent bilingual in the national language , Bahasa Indonesia. Bahasa Indonesia is used in the schools , and it is increasingly used by Larantukans in the city . Many chi ldren begin to learn Bahasa Indonesia only when they start to go to school , and the teacher must use dialectal Malay to communicate with the children especially in the lower grades , even though the official language of instruction is Bahasa Indonesia .

136 THREE Y. KUMANIRENG

ASMAH HAJI OMAR

B I B L I OGRAPHY

19 7 1 Standard language and the standardization of Malay . Anthropological Lingui s ti cs 1 3 : 75-89 .

FERGUSON , Charles A .

19 59 Diglossia . Word 15/2 : 32 5- 340 .

HAUGEN , Einar

1972 Dialect , language , nation . In : Anwar S . Dil , ed. The ecology of language : essays by Einar Haugen . . . , 2 3 7- 2 5 4 . Stanford : University Press . ( First published 1966 in American Anthropologis t 68 : 922-935 . )

McDAVID , Raven I . , Jr

1969 Dialects : British and American standard and nonstandard . In : Archibald A . Hill , ed . Linguis tics toda y , 79-88 . Voice of America Forum Series 2 5 . New York and London : Bas ic Books .

Kumanireng, T.Y. "Diglossia in Larantuka, Flores: a study about language use and language switching among the Larantuka community". In Halim, A., Carrington, L. and Wurm, S.A. editors, Papers from the Third International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics, Vol. 3: Accent on variety. C-76:131-136. Pacific Linguistics, The Australian National University, 1982. DOI:10.15144/PL-C76.131 ©1982 Pacific Linguistics and/or the author(s). Online edition licensed 2015 CC BY-SA 4.0, with permission of PL. A sealang.net/CRCL initiative.