• October 28^th, 2017
• Fredy Torang Widiyanto Munthe (Centre Religius CS-University of Gadjah Mada)

Abstrack:

This paper will discuss indigenous tradition of Toba people of Sumatera. It will specifically discuss how Toba people conceptualize the protection and sustainability of environment based on their indigenous tradition. Toba indigenous tradition is characterized by ?inter-subjectivity? cosmology, which means that human beings and other beings who live in the environment are all ?subject.? Relationship between humans and environment is perceived as ?inter-subjective? relation. This paper will show how Toba people construct their inter-subjective cosmology through their concept ?tondi,? prevalent in Toba rituals in which data of inter-subjective concept are collected. Tondi for Toba people is a kind of ?life force? that determines the existence and life of a being: human and non-human beings. Human beings relate to other beings like trees, Water, mountains and so forth because those beings have tondi. The existence of tondi in a being constitutes the subjectivity of the being. Furthermore, Toba people understand that the life of human beings could only be guaranteed if tondi of other beings are protected, of if the environment in protected. This paper will analyze a ritual of ?manuk gantung? trough which the notion of tondi and of inter-subjectivity is conceptualized and reproduced. This paper, following Nurit Bird-David (1999), will finally argue that the Toba indigenous concept of environmental protection is local wisdom of Toba people that deserves more attention as an alternative to thinking about solving environmental crisis of the present time. read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Batari Oja (University of Gadjah Mada)

Abstrack:

During post-Soeharto era, Tionghoa people tried to rebuild their primordial identity, so called ?Tradition?. Meanwhile, on the other hand, they gained legitimacy from the government by embracing the state official religion, namely Buddhism. Therefore, since New Order Era, many Klentengs (Tionghoa Shrines) are considered as Vihara. This study discusses the boundary between Tradition and Buddhism by looking at the symbolic features in them. Then, it finds the category of Viharas in Makassar. Cap go Meh, as the cultural interaction space, is a very helpful sample in observation for looking at the symbolic features. However, on Cap go Meh 2014, Tionghoa begin to present their ethnic identity as Tionghoa, and not their religious identity as Buddhist. Therefore, Cap go Meh is an interesting phenomenon to discuss; it is a space of representing identity, as an event beyond religious label, and as an independent event from state politics. It is a progress of Tionghoa culture in Indonesia post-Soeharto. On the other side, it is also an astonishing result of how religious studies can be an entrance into another dimension of historical and political genealogy. read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Leonard Chrysostomos Epafras (Inter-Religious Studies/Indonesian Consortium for Religious Studies UGM Graduate School)

Abstrack:

This study is an exploration of polemical discourse of the Sacred Name Movement and Hebraic Root Movement among Indonesian Christians, against other Christian communities in Indonesia. The former is attempting to retrace the Judaic root of Christianity and incorporate some of the presumed Judaic traditions into its religious system. One distinct feature of it is the enthusiasm to revive the ancient name of Biblical God, the Tetragrammaton, and claimed it as the truest name of Christian God. The preference of the name is going hand in hand with the groups? antagonistic attitude toward the more traditional usage of name of God, ?Allah,? notably as appears in the standard Indonesian Bible translation. This position obviously put the group at odds with larger Christian community. The study is meant to understand the politics of identity through the polemic of the name of God, especially in connection with the complicated interaction between Indonesian Christians and Muslims. read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Saefur Rochmat (History Departement, Faculty of Social Politic UNY, Yogyakarta)

Abstrack:

Wahid understood that the Muslims had difficulties dealing with the issue of modern system of knowledge as the product of the Western civilization, however, he did not agree with Samuel P. Huntington?s thesis on the clash of civilization between Islam and the West. This was due to Wahid believing in the cosmopolitan nature of Islamic civilization which has the ability to absorb any sciences of other civilizations and to suit them with Islamic cosmology, namely spirituality. Moreover, both Islamic and Western civilizations share the same root of Hellenic civilization. Accordingly, Wahid tried to incorporate the development of modern sciences and philosophy into the Fiqh paradigm as he tried to find a balance between the normative aspect of the religion and the freedom of thinking in matters of secular affairs. This implies that he recognized the double truth (haqiqa almuzdawaja) that manifest into religious knowledge (based on the heart) and secular sciences (based on the ratio). He argued that secular science is to implement the truth of religious knowledge with the realistic actions in the worldly life. In line with this, he did not agree with the ideological character of any knowledge systems and tried to harmonize the tendencies of Marx?s materialistic life and of Sufis? individualistic spiritual life. read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Ferry Muhammadsyah Siregar (Interreligious Studies (IRS) The UGM Graduate School Universitas Gadjah Mada)

Abstrack:

This paper explores the source of inspiration and community practices through the study of theology and tafsir of diversity in pesantren of Nahdhatul Ulama (NU) and Muhammadiyah in Yogyakarta. This choice of the two pesantrens is based on the assumption that NU and Muhammadiyah pesantrens are the representation of social, cultural, and religious communities in Yogyakarta. Religious tradition of NU and Muhammadiyah represent the mainstream of Islamic tradition whose strong roots in Yogyakarta. It also aims at identifying opportunities and potential for spiritual and material dimensions owned by the pesantren communities. This paper finds that the formation of religious and multicultural perspective of pesantrens in Yogyakarta has been gradually, systematically and continuously formed through Islamic text and multicultural practices. read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Supadiyanto, S.Sos.I., M.I.Kom. (Lecturer in Communication Indonesia (AKINDO) and Communication Radya Binatama (AKRB) of Yogyakarta;)

Abstrack:

The problem of corruption and poverty into two central issues that ensnare the lives of millions of people in Indonesia. As from the ruling Reform Order (May 21, 1998) until now, various corruption scandals; really hampers national development. The end of the New Order government of President Soeharto replaced Reform Order under the leadership of B.J. Habbie; Abdurrahman Wahid, Megawati Sukarnoputri, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Joko Widodo; not automatically lower the quantity of cases of corruption and quantity of poor people in Indonesia. There are two main problems. One, how the character of the Reform Order government in Indonesia? Two, how to overcome the problem of corruption, poverty, and political communication disharmony Reform Order in Indonesia? This is a qualitative research paradigm. In the type of qualitative research, the researcher has full authority to determine the sources of appropriate information accessible to the research of good quality. All the resources obtained through a literature review. Time studies were conducted in June- September 2014 As a result, there are four main characters of rule Reform Order. First, the quantity of state officials and former officials of the state (executive, judicial, legislative) involved in increasingly large corruption scandal. Secondly, the quantity of poor people has fluctuated or shifting up and down. Third, the amount of foreign debt for more than 16 years in power Reform Order continued to rise sharply. Fourth, political communication constructed by the political elite is still sectoral ego, has not been able to cross-sectoral and cross-party political; resulting in the grouping of the political community. As a solution to overcome the problems of corruption, poverty, and political communication disharmony Reform Order is to give birth to the leaders at the level of the executive, judicial, and legislative professional and honest so as to minimize the corruption scandal. Others, by empowering the poor through a variety of self-collegial entrepreneurship programs. In addition, it also can be done with nullify the amount of foreign debt, to boost national revenue through a variety of creative activities that involve the private sector, government, and educational institutions. The final step to synergize the entire political elite in the vision-mission of national development of short-term, medium, and long-through political communication-oriented principle of prosperity, welfare, justice, and family. read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Rachmanto (Center for Religious and Cross-cultural Studies Graduate School, Universitas Gadjah Mada)

Abstrack:

One of most important events in the modern history of Indonesia was Reformation of 1998, event marked by the collapse of Soeharto’s regime. That regime was full of corruption. No wonder the one of the Reformations agenda was to fight corruption. Indonesians realized that corruption at the root of many problems in the country. Without addressing corruption, Indonesia would fail to become a prosperous country. Unfortunatelly, nearly 16 years after Refomation corruption still exists. Even it has become worst (despite many efforts to eradicate corruption by government and society). Corruptors always find a new way to exploit the system. To solve this problem, there are so many civil society that always try to enggage in coruption eradication. One of them is Muhammadiyah. The biggest modern organization in Indonesian. Muhammadiyah has a moral responsible to overcome the problem of corruption in Indonesia. This writing want to explain about the effort of Muhammadiyah against corruption. There are two questions that want to be answered. First, what is the effort (either has been done or will be done) by Muhammadiyah in order to against corruption? Second, how effective those effort to eradicate corruption from Indonesia? The results of this writing shows that Muhammadiyah fights corruption on two levels: at the grass root and at the national level. In grass root level, Muhammadiyah actively campaigns to educate citizens about the dangers of corruption. At the national level, Muhammadiyah makes a coalitions with other civil society groups to criticize the government, but with less attention to solve corruption. However Muhammadiyah?s efforts to fight corruption have been ineffective. The problem is Muhammadiyah put too much attention on moralistic movement. Whereas the corruption in Indonesia has been spread. So, Muhammadiyah need more practice effort to against corruption. In all level. To solve that problem, Muhammadiyah must make a new orientation and strategic plan that more practice. read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Subandri Simbolon (Center for Religious and Cross-cultural Studies, Graduate School of UGM)

Abstrack:

Corruption is a problem of civilization which at the end, it can be a cultural problem. This corruption problem must be confronted with reviving the cultural values of anticorruption. Learning from anti-corrupt, local cultures can be a powerful weapon to fix corruption tendencies of a state. Beliefs in the high local cultural values become the basics of these efforts. The whole value of it can be a basic reference against the tendency. In other words, the culture will form the human beings who live in that civilization. One of the activities in traditional ceremonies of Batak Toba is mambagi jambar (sharing pieces of meat to certain parties). This article aspires to offer an overview of these activities, as unitary of the cultural activities of the anti-corrupt. By basing the writing on ethnographic interviews, and analysis of any related text, the author describes this discussion in a systematic paper. The first part is, the introduction of global corruption as in an issue and the issue of corruption in Indonesia as an example of a major problem. In the second part, how the activity padalan jambar juhut in Toba Batak culture leads us to understand the position of the activity in the local Batak Toba culture. Then, in the last part in addition helps us to know about these activities and their contributions in an effort to revive the cultural values of the anti-corrupt. read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Fazlul Rahman (Ph.D student of ICRS- Graduate School of Gadjah Mada Univ, Yogjakarta,)

Abstrack:

The extension of public sphere into digital public sphere (digisphere) gives birth to new problematic issues: the problem of relationship (relationship one has with the self ?the technology of the self or self-construction ?and social relationships between people, and relations between human and their tools), the problem of control, and the most critical, the problem of religious authority. In general, late modernity has witnessed a general shift of authority from ?without? to ?within,? from external institutions to personal institution (James Proctor, 2006), even ?beyond personal institution.? Accordingly, in the issue of religious authority in digisphere, I would like to argue that Internet have reshaped how people perceive religious authority, which is no more ?top-down? (theologian to non-theologian), but bottom-up or cooperative. In the other words, there is the dislocation (experienced not only in the religious sites) and deteritorialization (religious authority not only belong to theologian) of religious authority in the digisphere. These dislocation and deteritorialization in the digisphere give significant impacts on Indonesian inter-religious life, particularly which related to the issue of intolerance among different religious groups, in a way that religion will no more monopolized by one single authority. In this research, I will see this issue from the perspective of Pandhalungan people. Pandhalungan region refers to a region in the northern coastal areas in the eastern province of East Java with Madurese-background majority. The so-called Pandhalungan people is, culturally, a hybrid society consists of two mixed dominant cultures Java and Madura. Social ethics of Pandhalungan people rooted in the values of two dominant cultures, Java and Madura, among them are: politeness, respect (being respectful to elders and people who has high social class is very important for Pandhalungan people, more over to their teachers and Kyai), and high work ethic. Based on those considerations, this research will question to what extend the changing pattern of religious authority in digisphere affects Pandhalungan people?s perception of religious authority (together with their local wisdoms) in responding to the issue of intolerance among religious groups. As a pilot project, this paper will shed the lights on three particular issues: the discourse of religious authority, the phenomenon of Kyais (religious leaders) as the representatives of religious authority among society, and the cultural and socio-religious background of the Pandhalungan people read more

• October 28^th, 2017
• Laila Kholid Alfirdaus (Indonesian Consortium of Religious Studies (ICRS), Post-Graduate School, Gadjah Mada University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia)

Abstrack:

Padang, West Sumatra, is noted to rarely experience mass violent conflict, although it is known to be a plural city, in which several ethnic groups reside together with the native ethnic group, namely Minangkabau. Indeed, this does not mean that Padang does not have problems. The issues of discrimination against ethnic Chinese post-2009 earthquake, as well as the application of Perda Syariah issued in mayor Fauzi Bahar?s first term (2004-2009) that have resulted strong social tension between different ethnic and religous groups are amongst the most important problems to mention. However, unlike many other big cities in Indonesia, as Solo, Semarang, Medan, and Makasar, in which mass violence is easily exploded, the social tension in Padang is often successfully managed. In this regards, looking at the cultural aspects of Minangkabau society, in addition to the political economy perspective, is important, and raso pareso, the cultural practice of Minangkabau, applied not only by ethnic Minang, but also by the other minority ethnic groups, including ethnic Chinese, could not be avoided to discuss. The assertion of mutual-respect, tolerance, mutual understanding, evidence based argumentation, and long-term oriented behaviors in raso pareso has helped people from different ethnic groups to build peaceful social interactions. This has enabled, for instance, the building of trading relation between ethnic Minang and ethnic Chinese in the midst of long-existing problems of religious differences. In fact, raso pareso has not only been social ethics, more importantly, it has also been social exchange for enabling the building of consensus and commitment to share in trading, and in the other fields of social life. Neverteheless, raso pareso is also very political for becoming the bargaining tool for different ethnic groups in Padang through the politics of accommodation and the politics of recognition. Using the framework of social ethics, social exchange and politics, this paper discusses how the cultural practice like raso pareso, in addition to the political economy factor, could enable the peaceful encounters between different ethnic groups in Padang. Given the technical limitation, this paper is limited to discuss ethnic Minang and ethnic Chinese relationship. read more