Research projects
Read the original research papers written by our coursemates collaboratively on this field trip here.
Papuan transfer in the use of Standard Indonesian: Morphosyntactic, lexical and phonological evidence
Athena Leher, Aurora Chan
With increasing contact between the Indonesian central government and its Papua provinces, many studies have focused on Papuan attitudes towards the Standard Indonesian as a lingua franca, and the diminishing of Papuan culture and heritage. However, to date, few studies have specifically looked at contact between Standard Indonesian and Papuan languages. The present study therefore aimed to explore: 1) whether young Papuan speakers show Papuan features in their use of Standard Indonesian, and what such features are; 2) whether a stronger command of Papuan varieties resulted in a greater degree of transfer. Papuan and Indonesian speakers were recruited to partake in a video-description task in Standard Indonesian, with alternating conditions of patient animacy. They were also prompted with questions that would elicit differences in voice and verbs of transfer. Our results showed that Papuan speakers indeed used syntactic structures unique to Papuan languages and included Papuan-Indonesian code-mixing at the lexical and morpheme level. Additional findings included individual speaker inconsistency in formality and code-mixing, which we attribute to adherence to task demands and Papuan languages’ status as low-prestige varieties.
Language Contact between Javanese and Bahasa Indonesia among university students in Yogyakarta,
with a focus on language borrowing
Blair Leung, Krystinis Tang
This research examines the language contact phenomenon between Javanese and Indonesian among university students in Yogyakarta, Central Java, with a specific focus on lexical borrowing. With the aim of understanding the impact of Indonesian on Javanese language, 12 university students participated in group discussions conducted in Javanese. The hypothesis posited lexical borrowing from Indonesian and the incorporation into Javanese among the younger generations. Through transcription and glossing of the participants' responses, we categorized the borrowed words and explored the motivations behind this phenomenon. Surprisingly, our findings indicate that 11.5% of borrowed words originated from Indonesian, while 2.5% were from English and 0.1% from Old Javanese. Notably, interjections, nouns, and adjectives emerged as the most affected lexical categories. Additionally, we discovered that social prestige played a significant role in lexical borrowing in Javanese from Indonesian. These insights contribute to the preservation of Javanese and underline the importance of understanding language contact dynamics.
Decoding the Functions of Affixes in Indonesian:
A Morphosemantic Analysis
Calista Chan, Jaye Shum
This qualitative descriptive study is designed to investigate the morphosemantic analysis of affixes in Bahasa Indonesian, with a particular emphasis on prefix and suffix functions. As a highly agglutinative language, the use of affixes is indispensable for effective communication. The study employed interviews with individuals at the University of Sanata Dharma, Yogyakarta, to analyze the distribution and meaning of affixes. The results revealed that affixes can be categorized based on five morphosemantic features: derivation, inflection, causation, direction, quantity, and formality. In addition, the study demonstrated a noteworthy disparity in the use of prefixes and suffixes in terms of aspect and productivity. Moreover, the investigation identified distinctive patterns in the application of affixes among base forms with different word classes, including verbs, nouns, and prepositions. These findings have significant implications for language education and the study of morphosemantics in Indonesian. The research contributes to the existing literature by presenting a comprehensive analysis of the functions and distribution of affixes in Indonesian.
How Language Shift Happens in Indonesia: A Comparison between Javanese and Bahasa Indonesia
Carmen Wong, Belle Lai
This paper investigates the language shift in Indonesia by comparing the usage of Javanese and Bahasa Indonesia and identifying the factors that contribute to this phenomenon. The study employs a range of methods, including questionnaires, interviews, discussions, and the collection of daily conversations between local students. Our findings reveal a growing trend in the usage of Bahasa Indonesia, which is perceived as more modern, national, and convenient as a lingua franca. Participants reported feeling more comfortable using Bahasa Indonesia compared to Javanese or other regional languages. Additionally, the study shows that younger generations have seemingly forgotten how to use Javanese due to insufficient exposure in daily life and a lack of support from education policies.
Our study found that over 50% of participants preferred to use Bahasa Indonesia when communicating with friends and family, as it is perceived as a language that fosters intimacy and closeness by removing formalities and barriers that may exist in other languages. The use of Bahasa Indonesia may also provide advantages in careers, as it is widely spoken and used in formal settings throughout the country. These findings suggest that the language shift observed in our study may be attributed to the influence of intimacy and language attitudes in shaping language use.
In conclusion, our study highlights the growing preference for Bahasa Indonesia over Javanese and other regional languages, the declining use of Javanese among younger generations, the changing language use between listeners, and the influence of intimacy and language attitudes on language shift in Indonesia. These findings underscore the need for efforts to preserve and promote regional languages and to recognise the social and cultural factors that shape language use and attitudes in contemporary Indonesia.
Possessive construction and the use of -nya and dari
in Bahasa Indonesia
Desiree Chung, Eusia Pang
In Bahasa Indonesia, possessive constructions are usually expressed by the suffix -nya and dari. Two tasks, including answering questions in the Google Form and four-panel comics, were carried out at the Sanata Dharma University, Yogyakarta, to examine how Bahasa Indonesia speakers use possessive constructions. The existence and position of -nya and dari were investigated. Results showed that the possessive constructions vary among different speakers. The reasons may be due to the multiple functions of -nya and dari and the various interpretations of the context in the sentences of the two tasks. Thus, these matters are also investigated in this paper. To conclude, Bahasa Indonesia relies mainly on [NP N N], with the former noun being possessed and the latter being possessor (Sneddon, 2010). The interpretation of possessive constructions in Bahasa Indonesia depends on context to avoid ambiguity.
The Expression of Location and Space: A cross-linguistic study in Indonesian and Javanese
Felix Lew, Carol Leung
Different languages have their own unique ways of expressing locative and special relations, despite the shared language family. This study aimed to examine the locative construction in two closely related languages, Indonesian and Javanese with the use of qualitative and quantitative approaches. As the two Western Austronesian languages are both widely spoken in Yogyakarta, interviews and video clip elicitation were conducted for two main objectives: 1) to compare the locative patterns; 2) to investigate the role of individual factors of age and preferred language between these two languages. Our findings reveal that Javanese speakers tend to use simple constructions instead of complex ones. Foundings suggest that age, the implications of the languages preferred in daily life, as well as occupation play a role in explaining this pattern.
Code-switching among Youngsters from Jakarta and
Hong Kong: A Crosslinguistic View
Peace Law, Jacky Cheung
Upon our arrival in Indonesia, we could already hear people of different ethnicities seamlessly switching between various languages. Inspired by the way young people from Jakarta code-switch different languages and dialects, our project aims to observe and investigate (i) patterns of code-switching among young people in Jakarta, (ii) key factors that influence their code-switching behavior and (iii) some similarities and differences in code-switching behavior between Jakarta and Hong Kong. Data were collected via natural conversation elicitation. While analyzing the data, we discovered a great deal of interesting properties in terms of lexicon and syntactic structure, such as the replacement of Indonesian pronouns, subsequent possessors, morphological adaptation and beyond. Possible explanations for such a language alternation include the call for referential and expressive functions, along with various social factors. We concluded that code-switching is a complex behavior of multilinguals, exhibiting high variety in terms of structure, psycholinguistics, and society. It might be difficult to find universal patterns of code-switching, but it seems that code-switching across different speech communities is constrained by a Matrix Language-Frame (MLF).
