Lead by senior lecturer Ni Luh Ketut Mas Indrawati, a team of six researcher from Udyana University journeyd up the hill in the Northern part of Bali Island to collect data from the Pedawa Bali Aga Village, Buleleng Regency. Udayana University reserchers Ida Ayu Made Puspani, Ni Wayan Sukarini, Ketut Artawa, Ni Wayan Putri Oktaviani, Indy Nurhayati, Putu Georgiana Ananta Suyasa and Mas Indrawati took on the research of retention of local dialects under the pressure from the tourism activities.
Arrival of the team to the village
The Balinese language has been claimed to have two main dialects, the Bali Dataran dialect (BD) and the Bali Aga dialect (BA) (Bawa, 1983; Clynes, 1995; Denes, 1982). The Bali Aga dialect is often called the Bali Mula dialect which is spoken by people in the highlands of Bali and the Bali Dataran dialect is spoken by people in the lowlands of Bali. Most of Bali Aga dialects are spoken in mountainous regions which has a far smaller population (Hara, 2015). Bali aga villages include: Tigawasa, Pedawa, Sembiran, Julah, Sidatapa, Cempaga, Bayung Gede, Penglipuran, Tenganan Pegringsingan, and Trunyan. These villages are in mountainous areas and among them Pedawa, Penglipuran, and Tenganan Pegringsingan villages have been promoted as tourist destinations due to their uniqueness in their history, cultural heritage, custom, and traditions.
Map of Bali
Language maintenance and shift are interrelated linguistic symptoms. The language can be said to have experienced a shift if the community began to not use or had left the traditional language, in this case the Balinese dialect of Bali Aga. The consequences of the language shift are the marginalization of the Balinese dialect of Bali Aga and the rise of other languages or Indonesian. Responding to this phenomenon, language defense will occur if the language community still maintains the use of their language (Agustina, 2010). Language defense can be seen if a language is still used and chosen to be used in certain situations.
Meeting at the village office with the Village Head
The team, the Head of the Village, and the staff
Ni Wayan Sukarini, Ni Luh Ketut Mas Indrawat and Ida Ayu Made Puspani donating to the Pedawa village
Pedawa Bali Aga Village is a newly developing tourist destination, included in several tour packages which brings in contacts with many speakers of different languages, therefore shifts in language use of locals could happen. To collect data and answer questions whether the villagers still maintain their local language, Udayana University researchers first build the ties with local community and collected data from 40 Pedawa villagers in four trips from February to May 2024. These were responses to questionnaires, recorded word lists and interviews on the use of the local language Bali Aga in Pedawa.
Ida Ayu Made Puspani is interviewing an informant
Ni Wayan Sukarini interviewing an informant
The team plans to extend their research into other ares of extensive tourist destinations in the area of Balis Aga speakers. The analyses of the collected data is ongoing, but the first results show that the villagers still use the Bali Aga Language among them in daily conversation.
References:
Bawa, I. W. (1983). Sintaksis Bahasa Bali. Pusat Pembinaan dan Pengembangan Bahasa, Departemen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan.
Clynes, A. (1995). Balinese”. D. Tryon (Ed.). Comparative Austronesian dictionary. An Introduction to Austronesian Studies, 495–509.
Denes, I. M. (1982). Geografi Dialek Bahasa Bali. Pusat Pembinaan dan Pengembangan Bahasa Departemen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan.
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 873207.
Comments