From the Mouths of Babes: Children in Recent Indonesian Film and Fiction
Keywords:
Indonesian fiction, Indonesian film, children, Bildungsromant, quest narratives
Abstract
A noticeable trend in recent Indonesian fiction and film has been the use of children as protagonists. This paper examines the role of children in Andrea Hirata’s 2005 novel Laskar Pelangi (Rainbow Warriors) and the 2006 film Denias, directed by John de Rantau. I argue that, like the German Bildungsromane, these texts belong to a genre that might be called ‘coming of age’ or quest narratives. And yet, importantly, they are not just about the personal experience of finding one’s place in the world; the young protagonists of these texts also carry the weight of nation-building on their slender shoulders. The texts are not, therefore, simple derivations from European Bildungsromane, but are shaped by colonialism and globalizationDownloads
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References
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Andrea Hirata (2005). Laskar Pelangi. Yogyakarta: Bentang Pustaka.
Berlant, L. (1997). The Queen of America goes to Washington city. Durham: Duke University Press.
Bruford, W.H. (1975). The German tradition of self-cultivation, London: CUP.
Buckley, J. (1974). Season of youth: The Bildungsroman from Dickens to Golding. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
Campbell, J. (1971). The hero with a thousand faces. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Caton, L. F. (1996). Romantic struggles: The Bildungsroman and mother-daughter bonding in Jamaica Kincaid’s Annie John’. MELUS, 21(3), 125-142. [CrossRef]
Frye, N. (1963). Fables of identity: Studies in poetic mythology. New York: Harcourt, Brace and World.
Hardin, J. (Ed.). (1991). Reflection and action: Essays on the Bildungsroman. Columbia: University of South Carolina.
Kementerian Pendidikan Nasional Republik Indonesia. Retrieved July 12, 2011 from http://www.kemdiknas.go.id/kementerian/kementerian-pendidikan-nasional.aspx.
Kunene, D.P. (1991). Journey in the African epic, Research in African Literatures, 22(2), 205-223.
Skow, J. (1996, June 24). Setting free the word. Time. Retrieved July 12, 2011, from http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,984884,00.html.
Published
2012-04-10
How to Cite
Allen, P. (2012). From the Mouths of Babes: Children in Recent Indonesian Film and Fiction. K@ta: A Biannual Publication on the Study of Languange and Literature, 13(2), 179-187. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.9744/kata.13.2.179-187
Section
Articles
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License
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