Jakarta - The Jakarta Arts Council urges the city administration to accommodate all Betawi culture including marginal aspects, which is greatly influenced by Chinese and Portuguese cultures, in its Betawi arts center project.
“The exclusion of the Betawi Pinggir [Rural Betawi] culture will lead to great concern,” Firman Ichsan, head of the council, said Thursday.
He said that Betawi culture did not belong only to the majority cultural group, Betawi Tengah (Central Betawi), which is mostly influenced by Arabic culture.
The Rural Betawi, considered a minority, is also rich in culture. It is influenced by the Chinese and Portuguese.
Rural Betawi comprises of several small community groups, such as the Cina Benteng in Tangerang, south of Jakarta, and those influenced by Portuguese in North Jakarta.
Firman called upon the marginal Betawi cultural groups to actively show efforts to preserve their culture. “They have to show their efforts by conducting more cultural activities so that the public learns more about them,” he said.
“It’s obvious that cultural development of Central Betawi is faster than that of other groups. This is because the people of Central Betawi are more active in preserving their culture,” he said.
“All this time, for example, the Cina Benteng cultural preservation efforts are more likely to move toward the national level as Chinese-Indonesian culture instead of Betawi culture,” he said.
The city administration plans to convert a former military base on Jl. Raya Bekasi, East Jakarta, into a Betawi arts center based on the idea of the Betawi Consultative Body, which supervises the activity of the Betawi Culture Institution (LKB). The art center is expected to open in 2012.
LKB head Tatang Hidayat said that his institution’s Betawi culture preservation areas covered Greater Jakarta.
“We facilitate all Betawi cultural activities, including those acculturated from China or Europe. Once it is acculturated, it belongs to Muslim Betawi, for example gambang kromong.
“But Cina Benteng arts and the cokek dance of Rural Betawi are not Betawi culture,” he said.
Sarnadi Adam from the LKB said that the institution mostly facilitated the Muslim-Betawi culture. “The LKB is under the consultative body, so we follow its rule,” he said.
However, he said that the LKB promoted all kinds of Betawi culture regardless of their influences. (ipa)
Source: http://www.thejakartapost.com
