Medan, 4 July 2024 – Dr. Suhandano, M.A., Head Lecturer of the Department of Language and Literature, was one of the prominent speakers at the 2nd National Virtual Seminar on Mother Language organised by the Linguistics Doctoral Study Programme of the Faculty of Cultural Sciences (FIB) of North Sumatra University (USU). The seminar, held on 4 July 2024, was attended by students, lecturers, and language researchers from various regions in Indonesia.

On the occasion, Dr Suhandano presented a talk entitled ‘Voice Systems of Indonesian and Javanese Imperative Clauses’. The talk explored the uniqueness and complexity of voice systems in Indonesian and Javanese, hoping to increase participants’ understanding of this distinctive linguistic phenomenon.

The voice system is an important aspect of linguistics, especially in Austronesian languages, involving theories of syntax, language typology, and comparative historical linguistics. Dr Suhandano emphasised that the study of the voice systems of Indonesian languages, which number around 700, offers a real picture of language diversity and contributes significantly to the understanding of Austronesian voice systems.

The event is also part of an effort to advance research and development in linguistics in Indonesia, with collaborative partners from the Linguistics Doctoral Study Programme at FIB USU. This seminar is expected to encourage further interest and research on voice systems and Austronesian linguistics in general.

Thursday, August 29, 2024 became a very happy day for the Faculty of Cultural Sciences, Universitas Gadjah Mada. A total of 244 students of the Faculty of Cultural Sciences UGM undergraduate program have successfully completed their education in higher education. A total of 244 graduates of the Faculty of Cultural Sciences UGM hold a new title as a Bachelor.

This graduation period is a very special period in its history, which is the graduation period with the largest number of graduates. Because of this, this graduation was held in parallel, centered in the Soegondo Auditorium Room and connected to several other rooms on the same floor, namely the 7th floor of the R. Soegondo Building, Faculty of Cultural Sciences, Universitas Gadjah Mada.

Photo 1: Parallel Room of Undergraduate Graduation of Faculty of Humanities Period IV Academic Year 2023/2024

Photo 2: Dean of Faculty of Humanities UGM gives a welcoming speech

The graduation ceremony was attended by the Dean of the Faculty of Cultural Sciences UGM, Prof. Dr. Setiadi, S.Sos., M.Si., Vice Dean for Academic and Student Affairs, Dr. Nur Saktiningrum, S.S., M.Hum. Vice Dean for Finance, Assets, and Human Resources, Suray Agung Nugroho, S.S., M.A., Ph.D and representatives from each department and study program at the Faculty of Humanities.

In this graduation period, Valentino Yovenky Ardi Bentarangga, a student of the Cultural Anthropology Study Program achieved the highest GPA of 3.95 with a length of study of 3 years, 10 months; followed by Emily Trisnandi with a GPA of 3.94 from the English Literature Study Program with a length of study of 3 years 10 months.

The event was opened by singing Indonesia Raya, Gadjah Mada Mars, and Mars Sastra by Paramadaya. Then the dean of the Faculty of Cultural Sciences UGM, Prof. Dr. Setiadi, S.Sos, M.Si., delivered a welcome speech. In his speech, Setiadi congratulated the graduates and graduates, besides that he also conveyed several messages for graduates and graduates to continue their journey even though they had completed their studies and won a bachelor’s degree. The event was also enlivened by the entertainment performance of Geol Denok Dance by Ratnaraya Jawa, Javanese Literature Students. The next event was the handover of graduation documents in the form of diplomas and academic transcripts to graduates. In closing, a prayer was read by Mr. Hamdan, S.S., M.A.

Congratulations to all graduates! A bright future awaits you!

The Women’s Crisis Center is a place for complaints of various cases of violence experienced by women. So far, public attention has centered on the development of legal cases, and places the victim as the sole subject who experiences the effects of trauma. In fact, the traumatic effect spreads to other actors who listen and fight for the case. On the occasion of the Caring for the Victim, Caring for the Self seminar (27/08/2024), the Anthropology Department of the Faculty of Arts UGM invited Mona Elisa Behnke to share the results of her months of research with the assistants at one of the Women’s Crisis Centers in Java, especially Yogyakarta.

Mona Behnke is a doctoral candidate in Social and Cultural Anthropology at Free University Berlin, Germany. Her Master’s thesis was on hyperreality, state rhetoric and collective memory in contemporary Indonesia, and combined her interest in psychological and visual anthropology with a philosophical approach. After graduation, Mona worked for some time as a business anthropologist in the field of user experience and the organization of work structures. In her PhD project, she focused on the emotional labor of social assistance workers in a women’s crisis center in Java, Indonesia, touching on issues of emotion, gender, and conflict management.

Working in the humanitarian field has the consequence of great challenges, not only in terms of legal assistance skills, but also the skills that must be possessed to work in the field. Basically, gender itself is labor, where the articulation of actions, behaviors and performance are socially constructed in harmony. Women are considered more flexible in absorbing emotions and navigating concerns. Being an advocate for cases of violence against children and women makes them have to be able to navigate themselves technically and emotionally. Caring is the main asset that must be possessed by the assistants. Mona’s research tries to answer how care is practiced in a neutral environment through emotional labor from psychological and legal assistants.

Plunging as a companion shows that they consciously decide to enter a non-profit institution ready to experience institutionalization in three fundamental aspects, namely emotional labor, order of feelings, and emotion repertoires. ‘Emotional Labor’ refers to the management of emotions carried out to fulfill work performance when faced with clients. Facilitators are required to be able to harmonize their emotions with a socially constructed hierarchy or order. They must understand what emotions are allowed to be shown and not when listening to client stories. Repeated mentoring experiences shape their knowledge and memory of the repertoire of emotions when assisting clients. Furthermore, the process of assisting cases of violence against women and children has a dynamic approach both feminist and gender.

Listening to the emotions released by the client makes the companion experience second traumatization. This opens up further discussion that the experience of trauma is not only experienced by subjects who are directly treated with violence, but those who absorb the emotions of victims will also experience ‘second traumatization’, such as assistants and sign language interpreters. Emotional and mental exhaustion becomes the point where the assistants have an experience with the victim, beyond their technical skills. Mona describes the emotional flow of the helper and the victim in an interesting diagram, how the helper has to empty their emotional glass between before and after entering the hot table (where the client tells about their case). They professionally process their emotions in order to maintain themselves mentally so that they can continue to assist victims. This discussion brings us to the fact that the advocates actually have the potential to experience unequal care, where they give their full care to others, but they do not get the same care because they are considered not victims even though they absorb trauma from clients every day and fight for them. Sometimes, both survivors and caregivers feel very grateful when they can forget a very painful traumatic experience. From this we can conclude that forgetting is not a passive thing, but an active process that is also selective in building individual and collective memory. The ability to forget is also a valuable skill in emotional labor, in addition to the ability to remember which has been widely applied.

This discussion ended with several stories of assistants who were carrying out their temporal agencies by caring for each other and strengthening the emotional conditions of fellow assistants. Activities such as watching movies, joking, walking, telling stories and laughing out loud are a form of temporal agencies for the assistants so that their mental state is maintained and they can return to caring for other victims.

Author: Nuzul Solekhah
Photo: Puspita Nindya Sari

On 20 July 2024, Mohamad Yusuf, Lektor III/d from the Department of Anthropology, carried out Community Service activities on UGM Campus with the title ‘Writing Public Opinions’. The output of this activity is an opinion entitled ‘Building Tourism for What and For Whom?’, which is disseminated through newspapers. This opinion criticises the tourism development paradigm that currently focuses more on fulfilling the interests of large capitalist groups, while basic human values are often ignored.

In his writing, Yusuf voiced his concern over the direction and goals of tourism development, which is considered increasingly distant from the needs of local communities and humanity. He emphasises the importance of an approach that is more equitable and oriented towards common welfare, not just the benefits of a few parties. It is hoped that this opinion piece will spark further discussion and reflection on a more inclusive and sustainable future for tourism.

‘Solidarity Indonesia for Palestine’ aims to provide up-to-date information on the situation in Gaza and Palestine in general, highlight the effects of war on women and children, and implement and expand cooperation with partners, such as Dompet Duafa DIY and Amna Care Fund. This activity was held on Thursday, 28 March 2024, at Musholla An-Najah, Sleman, Yogyakarta. The Executive Director of Amna Care Fund delivered the material in Arabic so a translator companion was needed, Dr Mahmudah, M.Hum.

The activities also included fundraising conducted conventionally and through transfers or QRIS, with the total funds collected reaching almost 5,000,000.00. The funds will be channelled to the Amna Care Fund through Dompet Duafa DIY to support the dispatch of medical teams to Gaza, especially for the treatment of women and children with permanent disabilities. The event was closed with a group photo session.