JUST TO REMIND THAT WERE ALL JAVANESE AT HEART PRACTICES AND NARRATIVES OF JAVANESENESS IN JAVANESE SINGAPOREAN FAMILIES

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CHAPTER 1:
INTRODUCTION

Finding Javanese(ness) in Singapore
I want to start this thesis by presenting two snapshots of JavaneseSingaporeans. The first one is of a Singaporean of Javanese descent who started a
project in his work place with the intention of fostering appreciation for Javanese
culture. Soon, he brought his project to the attention of the wider public. He created
an online community at an internet-based social networking website Facebook. He
named his online group Orang Jawa di Singapura. 1 This online assemblage soon
attracted the attention of other Singaporeans of Javanese descent. In 2008, this group
merged with Javanese Singaporeans, another online community for Javanese
descendents of Singapore also hosted by Facebook. The merger between these two
groups created the present day Javanese Singaporeans. In their webpage, the creators
write the aims of their association, which is promoting the presence of Javanese in
Singapore who have been on the island “since over a century ago”. 2 They also aim to
make “younger generation Malays of Javanese descent to be more aware of their
[Javanese] roots”. Related to these objectives, the site Javanese Singaporeans has
been quite active in promoting Javanese culture in Singapore. The members of this
group pursue this objective by sharing information related to Javaneseness, such as
language, ritual, music, and philosophy, amongst themselves.
1

Orang Jawa di Singapura literally means “Javanese people in Singapore”.
All information on “Javanese Singaporean” is retrieved at 19 April 2010 from their webpage:
/>2


2

The second snapshot is about a Javanese dance and music troupe in Singapore
named Kesenian Tedja Timur, or simply Tedja Timur. This troupe is active in
promoting traditional Javanese dance and music, such as kuda kepang and gamelan
music. 3 For commemorating their anniversary 60th anniversary, Tedja Timur chose to
perform something special, a Javanese shadow puppet show titled “Ngawur”. 4 Soon
after they ended it, their extraordinary show invited comments from experts. 5
Apparently, this group performed a Javanese wayang kulit with “a local taste”. One
audience member who is knowledgeable about Javanese shadow puppets opined that
this group did not know how to perform Javanese shadow puppetry in “the right
way”. He added that they just “played around” with this refined traditional art. Yet,
another audience member made more sympathetic comment. He reckoned that this
performance was not something about authentic Javaneseness but rather about
producing “authentic Javaneseness that is uniquely Singaporean”.
This thesis is about the Javanese-Singaporeans and their narratives of
Javaneseness in present day Singapore. 6 In particular, I will discuss the practices of
Javaneseness in the everyday life of Javanese-Singaporean families by examining
their family and personal narratives. Thus, I outline my research around some
interconnected questions. What kinds of practices of Javaneseness do JavaneseSingaporean families have in their everyday life? What kinds of practices do these

3

Kuda kepang is Javanese horse dance performance. The dancers are dancing by holding horse
(kuda) dolls and accompanied by gamelan music.
4
Ngawur is a Javanese word for “wrong” but it also means “nonsense”.
5
Unfortunately, I did not have the chance to see the performance by myself. But I managed to
talk to some people who went to see the show that night.
6
Here I use the term “Javanese-Singaporeans” to denote Singaporean of Javanese ancestries. In

his study, Miyazaki uses the similar term, “Javanese-Malay”, to refer to “Malaysian with legal status as
Malay-Malaysian but have retained a strong consciousness of their Javanese origin.” See Miyazaki
(2000: 76-7).


3

families no longer have? What kinds of narratives on these practices do they produce?
How do their other identities in the present day influence their practices of
Javaneseness? By answering these questions, I argue that Javanese-Singaporean
families still maintain and/or negotiate their Javaneseness in present day Singapore.
However, their Javaneseness is not always similar to the one promoted by their
predecessors nor their cousins from Java and yet, it is also not necessarily inauthentic.
Although sharing a similar identity and traditions with their fellow Javanese in
Java, the current generation of Javanese-Singaporeans were born and grew up in
Singapore. Thus, their daily life activities are more or less similar with their fellow
Singaporeans (Abdul Aziz Johari 1960; Julina Khusaini 1988). Yet, this does not
mean that the sense of being Javanese is no longer important to them. On the contrary,
the present generation of Javanese-Singaporeans are quite active in preserving their
forefather's heritage as well as appreciating their ancestral culture. But these practices
are neither idyllic nor nostalgic in nature (c.f. Chua 1994). They are not simply
longing for their long lost ‘homeland’ or ‘motherland’ (c.f. Safran 1991). On the
contrary, they distance themselves from or even deny some aspect of their Javanese
culture that they do not see as fit with their current status as members of Singaporean
society. The practices of appreciating Javanese heritage and culture among JavaneseSingaporeans can indeed be seen as a unique one, guided by the light of their past as
well as their present condition.


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Background of the Study
When I arrived in Singapore for the first time, I thought that I had
disconnected myself with my previous life in a small town between the two old
capital cities of the two remaining Javanese kingdoms, Yogyakarta and Surakarta.
Before I left my hometown, I imagined Singapore to be a global-multicultural city,
where various populaces lived side by side with each other. Thus, I was expecting to
meet people who came from many places in the world with diverse ethnic and cultural
backgrounds. I, however, never had the slightest idea that I would meet people of
Javanese descent who had lived for generations in Singapore. I did know about the
Javanese in Suriname from my school history books but I never read or learned about
Javanese in Singapore.
I first learned about Javanese in Singapore quite indirectly. A friend, knowing
that I came from Central Java, told me that a few of our fellow students are of
Javanese descent. I was quite surprised to learn this because I could not see any
distinctive sign of Javaneseness among them. Nevertheless, a non JavaneseSingaporean friend informed me that she knew a lot of Javanese around. She added
that many of her Malay friends confessed to her that they are Javanese. Another
friend, a Malay-Singaporean, also informed me of this. He knew a lot of Javanese
descendents among the Malay population in Singapore. But when I asked him what
their distinctive features were and how to identify them among Malay-Singaporeans,
he could not give me a straight answer. “I just know that they’re Javanese,” he said.
Thus, I got the impression that Javanese-Singaporeans are a relatively invisible
community in Singapore.


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Due to their invisibility, Javanese-Singaporeans are hardly distinguishable for
someone who does not belong to the (Malay) Singaporean society. There are at least
two reasons behind their virtual invisibility. First, the number of Javanese people is
relatively small compared to the whole population of Singapore. According to Census

2000, the number of Javanese is 80,339 people, or 2.45 per cent of the whole
population of Singapore (Leow 2001). Second, a scholar studying Javanese in
Malaysia has attributed the invisibility of Javanese migrant in their host society to
“the omnipresence of their “Malay” status” (Miyazaki 2000: 77). The Javanese, due to
their same religion and similar custom, is perceived as closer or even belong as subethnic of the Malay race in the colonial racial constellation which is still preserved in
Singapore and Malaysia until today. Thus, the Javanese do not have their own place in
the official racial discourse in both nation-states.
Perhaps also because of their invisibility, Javanese are an understudied subject
in Southeast Asian Studies. Compared with the study on other migrant groups in
Southeast Asia, mainly Chinese and Indian, the study on Javanese migrant is
relatively thin. Only a few studies documented the history of their migration to
Malaya (Roff 1967; Tunku Shamsul Bahrin 1965, 1967a, 1967b; Lockard 1971;
Khazin Mohd Tamrin 1984). The lack is even more apparent for the study of Javanese
in Singapore. Although there have been several passing remarks in books on Malayan
history on the role of Singapore as the main entreport for Javanese migration to
Malaya (Roff 1967), there are no single publication dedicated to discuss the presence
of Javanese community in Singapore.


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Currently, there are only a few unpublished academic exercises on JavaneseSingaporeans (e.g. Abdul Aziz Johari 1960; Julina Khusaini 1988; Chia 1994). These
studies look at the sociological aspect of Javanese migrant’s lives in Singapore, such
as their social structure, social organization, history of migration, and relations with
other ethnic groups. For example, Abdul Aziz Johari (1960) study dwells with the
issue of Javanese “integration” into the Malay community. The similar theme of
Javanese migrant “integration” can be found in Julina Khusaini (1988). Yet, she goes
deeper by looking at the ways the Javanese maintain their “ethnic boundary” in a
multicultural society like Singapore. Meanwhile, Chia (1994) research is more
focused on the historical picture of Javanese migration to Singapore.

Migration Studies and Narratives Approach
The foci of the available studies on Javanese-Singaporeans mentioned above –
especially Abdul Aziz Johari (1960) and Julina Khusaini (1988) – are more or less in
line with the one of the mainstream theoretical outlook on migration studies, namely
the assimilation perspective. Assimilation is one of the oldest as well as the most long
lasting theoretical outlook on migration studies (Heisler 2000). This perspective
basically sees that the process of human migration will end after the migrant settle in
their new place of residence. The settlement process will be followed by assimilation
process which incorporates the migrant into the host society culture. Thus, this
perspective perceives assimilation as the eventual result of human migration.
Regardless, human migration and its outcome are never as simple as the
assimilation theorists would like to believe. The persistence of ethnic identity and the


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celebration of ties to the old homeland among the members of migrant communities
are some of the phenomena that show the complexities of human migration (Lewellen
2002). The desire to reconnect with the place of origins, which is commonly found
among the migrant’s descendants, only points out the flaw of assimilation theorists.
Instead of becoming fully integrated into the host culture, many migrant communities
have built their own social imaginations which often challenge that of the host
(Appadurai 1996). Thanks to the advances in communication and transportation
technologies, many migrants around the world today are becoming more connected
with their faraway homeland culture while at the same time remain associated with
their host society (Sun 2002; Georgiou 2006). Therefore, in the increasingly
globalized world, the migrants find themselves more often than not living between
two (or even more) worlds and this makes them constantly in the situation of cultural
hybridity (Werbner 1997) and hyphenated identities (Caglar 1997). All of these

conditions build an inherent complexity that is always present in migrant’s lives.
Perhaps, nobody but migrants themselves, really understand the complexities
of their own lives. Because these complexities are often overlooked by macro
sociological studies on migrant communities, some migration studies scholars have
resorted to narrative approach in order to capture the complexities of migrants’ lives
(e.g. DeRoche 1996; Chamberlain 1997, 1998; Brettell 2003; Olwig 2007; Besson and
Olwig 2005). Scholars argue that the conventional approach to migration could only
offer large-scale pictures of migration and thus do not provide the means to capture
the subjective side of migrants’ everyday life (Brettel and Hollifield 2000). Studying
migrant narratives, on the other hand, provides the necessary means for scholars to


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look deeper into their everyday lives as well as their subjective stories which are often
left undocumented by conventional historiography (Thomson 1999).
Early scholarships on migration looked at migrant narratives with the aim to
enrich the studies relying more on conventional sources such as written documents.
As has been pointed out by some scholars, their role is limited to gather “empirical
data” and “unrecorded and undocumented raw experience” on migrant’s lives
(Chamberlain and Leydesdorff 2004: 228). Thus, narratives studies are mostly
employed only when there are no available records and documents on the history of
migrant communities. However, the potencies of narratives studies are not limited for
collecting empirical data on migrant communities. Narrative approach is also adept
for capturing the subjective feeling experienced by the migrant. It lets us to get
“glimpses into the lived interior of migration processes” (Benmayor and Skotnes
1994: 14). Scholars nowadays start to see the importance of migrant’s subjective
experience, beside objective historical records, for gaining a better insight into
migrants’ lives. A look into the migrants’ subjectivities may permit us to know better
on the issue of migrant’s culture and identity (Chamberlain and Leydesdorff 2004).

In her study on the Barbadian migrant, Chamberlain (1997) shows how the
narrative approach on migration studies may uncover a subjective motive for
migration that is often overlooked by the macro approaches. She argues that for a
Barbadian, becoming a migrant is not necessarily motivated by pure economic
reasons; it may also be motivated by historical reason or tradition pertaining to
Barbadian migrant families since long time ago (Ibid). In one of the Barbadian
migrant narratives that she collected, we can find a statement which says that their


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family “love to travel” (Chamberlain 1997: 8). These ‘love to travel’ is commonly
found in these Barbadian family narratives. This narrative has been living in the
family for several generations and therefore defines the unique culture and identity of
Barbadian migrant.
In applying personal narrative approach to study migration, we may also
uncover the tension that often underlies migrants’ lives. Scholars studying migrants’
narratives have looked at changes and alteration in what they have termed as the
“migrant mentalities” (Chamberlain and Leydesdorff 2004: 228). Both scholars argue
that change in migrant mentalities can be observed from migrants’ narratives which
reveal “the tensions … between the old and the new” often surrounding their
migration process (Ibid: 233). Migrants, unlike their fellow who do not migrate,
experience life in two (or more) different places. This experience, most of the times,
creates tension between ‘the old and the new’: old place and new place; old home and
new home; old tradition and new host culture.
A similar tension between the past and the present can also be observed, albeit
subtly, from the memoir of a fourth generation of Javanese migrant in Singapore,
Hidayah Amin (2010). In her book, she recounts the history of her family, started with
her great grandfather – a Javanese from Surakarta who moved to Singapore to set up
his family business, and later became a successful businessman and a prominent

figure in Malay community. In her book, it is obvious that she never denounced her
Javanese root and heritage. Indeed, her childhood memoir contains many stories of
her family practices of Javaneseness related to language, ritual and beliefs.
Nevertheless, Hidayah today is not just a Javanese descent but also, just like her great


10

grandfather, a prominent figure among the Malay population. She also seems to
identify herself more with her Malayness rather Javaneseness as evidenced from the
subtitle of her book, “Memories of a Malay Childhood”.

The Significance of the Study
Against the above mentioned, this study on Javanese-Singaporeans has several
contributions. First, this study will contribute to the thin academic discourse on
Javanese migrant and migration, especially the ones in Singapore. As has been
mentioned before, there are only a handful of literatures on Javanese migrants and
their descendants in Singapore. Yet, these academic exercises do not offer us with a
clear picture of the life of Javanese-Singaporeans. Thus, this thesis will not just add
more information on this relatively understudied topic, it will offer a new way to look
at the life of Javanese-Singaporeans by using the personal narrative approach.
Second, the implementation of a narrative approach in this study will add
contribution to the developing field of migration studies in general. Personal narrative
approach offers a fresh way to study the life of migrants and their descendants by
presenting migration stories from the point of view of the migrants themselves. As has
been argued by Mary Chamberlain and Selma Leydessdorf (2004: 228), this approach
enables scholars to “examine migrant behavior and attitudes, subjectivities and
identities, in other words they can explore migrant mentalities and their shift over
time”.

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Third, this study will, for the first time, analyze the personal narratives of
Javanese-Singaporeans. No other academic exercises on Javanese-Singaporeans have
ever taken this approach. Personally, this narrative study has opened up my horizon to
complex lives of Javanese-Singaporeans as well as to their feelings, dreams and
imaginations to me. Thus, I humbly hope that this study will contribute in opening up
a new terrain of narrative studies, not just on Javanese-Singaporeans but also on other
ethnic minority groups in Singapore.

Methodology, Fieldwork, and Limitation of the Study
I conducted almost five months of fieldwork for my research from September
2009 until January 2010 in Singapore. In the first two months of my fieldwork
(September – October 2009), I conducted research on the history of Javanese
migration to Singapore. This was done by looking at the available historical records
and academic literatures, visiting public museums, and reading local newspapers and
oral history transcriptions. In the last three months (November 2009 – January 2010),
my fieldwork activities consisted mainly of in-depth interviews on JavaneseSingaporeans, which I carried out in many different places in Singapore. Besides indepth interviews, my fieldwork activities also consisted of several observations on the
performance of Javanese Kuda Kepang troupe in Geylang Serai.
In this thesis, I defined Javanese-Singaporean as Singapore citizen who have
or claim to have Javanese ancestry. As long as falling into these categories, I


12

disregarded my informants’ ethnicity/race in their Identity Card. 7 Yet, even with this
relatively relaxed definition of Javanese-Singaporeans, I still found difficulty in
identifying them. As has been mentioned above, it is difficult to recognize JavaneseSingaporeans because of their cultural proximities and physical resemblances with the
Malay. Thus, in order to identify my informants, I used snowball sampling method.

Initially, I selected my informants from the contact that I have developed. From here,
I asked my informants to suggest other suitable candidates for interview. With this
method, I was able to interview 11 Javanese-Singaporeans from six different families,
consisted of 9 females and 2 males, with age ranged from 24 to 78 years old. In term
of generation, my informants fall into the category of second, third, and fourth
generations of Javanese-Singaporeans. 8 All of the in-depth interviews were conducted
in the language which my informants felt most comfortable with, such as English,
Malay, Bahasa Indonesia, and Javanese.
I am aware that my position as male, Javanese, Indonesian researcher brought
out different responses from my informants than researcher with dissimilar
background. I rarely started with telling my informants of my background other than
introducing myself as Master student at National University of Singapore.
Nevertheless, they always asked my personal background, such as if I came from
Indonesia (because they recognized my accent) and if I am a Javanese. Some of my

7

Some of my informants have “Malay” as ethnicity/race in their Identity Card. Other than this,
they have “Javanese” and “Eurasian”. This is because the ethnicity/race of a newly born Singaporean
commonly follows her/his father. Many of Javanese migrants and their descendants in Singapore have
intermarried with people with different ethnic/race group.
8
Here, I defined the first generation as the migrant, regardless of their naturalization status.
Second generation will be the children of the first generation; the third will be the children of the
second generation, and so on.


13

informants even perceived me as “asli Jawa” (the original Javanese). 9 Yet, my status

as Javanese from Java gave me advantage as well as disadvantage in conducting
interviews. The advantage is the warm response that I got from some of my
informants, when they learned that I came from Java. Probably they perceived me as
their distance relative or friend. This is clear at least on one occasion when one of my
informants found out that I came from the same city with his grandfather, he called
me “tangga dhewe” (my own neighbor).
Meanwhile, my status as Javanese might have given me some disadvantages
during my fieldwork. For example, upon knowing that I am Javanese, one of my
informants seemed to look down upon the practice of Javaneseness among JavaneseSingaporeans. She disclosed not much information that I requested by saying that I
know much better about Javanese culture because I am “asli”. Perhaps, the very same
reason had made some informants to suspect my motive for conducting this research.
On some occasions, some potential informants subtly declined to be interviewed by
eluding my request.
Yet, status as Javanese did not always lead to suspicion. Many times, it invited
curiosity amongst my informants. Since it is my personal conviction that interview
does not have to be conducted in one-way communication, I always tried my best to
satisfy their curiosities by answering their questions on my background. Their
curiosities, sometimes, granted me with surprising questions which often caught me
unguarded. For example, one of my informants abruptly asked me if I am a Hindu,
once she learned that I came from Java. Others asked me unexpected questions, such

9

This often happened after they learned that I am Javanese from Java and I spoke Javanese.
Most of my informants asked me if I could speak Javanese after they knew that I came from Java.


14

as asking the recipe for making fried tempe in Javanese style (which is rather different

from Malay one). When this happened, the interview, sometimes, took longer than
expected since we exchanged any kind of information regarding anything related to
Java and Javanese culture.
Whenever possible, I always asked my informants to tell me their stories,
about themselves and their family. Sometimes, I did not fully succeed in inducing
them to do this. There are several reasons behind this. First, some of my informants
were quite shy and not open enough. This is because most of the interviews were
conducted at the first day I met them. The use of snowball sampling method and the
relatively short period of fieldwork do not provide me with ample time to build my
relationship with my informants prior to the interviews. Second, quite the opposite of
the first point, some of my informants showered me with excessive information. On
one occasion, one informant told me stories about her job and working place. Another
occasion, another informant gave me abundant life-related advices. Neither of this
information related directly to my questions nor my research in general. Yet, as it was
my intention to get as many stories as I could, I did not try to stop, and thus
discourage, them from doing this. The consequence of these difficulties to my thesis
is clear: I could not present a fully-unabridged narrative of my informants. The
narratives that I present in this thesis, despite extracted from the interviews, were the
result of some (re)organization or putting together of scattered information in order to
make them coherent for readers.
During all of my interviews, I, whenever feasible, always tried to use a tape
recorder so as to best capture my informants’ narratives. Most of my informants were


15

willing to be recorded and only a few of them declined to be so. Consequently, for
those who declined to be taped, I wrote down their accounts on my field notes to the
best of my ability and memory. During the writing of this thesis, I have tried my best
to write down and present, as correctly as possible, my informants’ narratives. I also

put my informants’ identities under pseudonyms with the intention of protecting their
privacies, unless they stated that it was their wish to be mentioned under their real
names.
I do not have the slightest intention to make any generalization from my
research finding nor to draw a generic explanation on Javanese migrants. I understand
the subjective nature of the migrants’ narratives that I present in my thesis. Therefore,
in agreement with what Battisti and Portelli (1994: 37-8) said on their narrative
approach, my thesis “do not attempt to generalize from a broader sample but focus on
the meanings and implications of a few significant narratives.” Thus, what I want to
highlight from my thesis is indeed the subjective meaning from each individual stories
about self and family that my informants have so willingly shared with me.

Chapters Organization
This thesis is divided into six chapters. This introduction serves as Chapter 1
of this thesis. Here, I have outlined the background of my study on JavaneseSingaporeans. I have also discussed the previous literatures on this topic and review it
against the recent development on the larger field of migration studies. In the final
section of this chapter, I have given the outline of my research methodology, my brief
report on fieldwork, and on the limitation of my study.


16

Chapter 2 will revolve around the question of who are the JavaneseSingaporeans. I start this chapter by exploring the historical narratives of Javanese
migration to Singapore, then part of the British Malaya, since the early nineteenth
century up to the mid twentieth century. Next, my discussion moves to position of
Javanese people in the newly formed Republic of Singapore. Here, I also discuss
several public policies of the new government which affected the live of JavaneseSingaporeans.
In Chapter 3, I introduce the family narratives of six Javanese-Singaporean
families that I studied. Here, I give broad sociological picture of JavaneseSingaporean families by examining family histories from the six families. My
discussion on the family histories of the six families focuses on several important

dimensions of their family histories, such as their places of origin, migration,
livelihood, settlement, and marriage. The background information that I present in this
chapter also serves as context for the narratives of Javaneseness discussed in the
following chapter.
Chapter 4 presents the narratives about practices of Javaneseness from the
members of six Javanese-Singaporean families. Through their narratives, I show how
these Javanese-Singaporean families continue to carry out their practices of
Javaneseness in Singapore today. In examining their narratives, I focus my discussion
on several significant practices of Javaneseness which I found in the studied families.
These practices are visiting Java, speaking Javanese, and carrying out a Javanese
wedding.


17

In Chapter 5, I demonstrate the intricacy of the constructions of Javaneseness
in Singapore today around the themes of Malayness and Islam. Specifically, I show
how Javanese-Singaporean families modify, alter, and shift their practice of
Javaneseness under the influence of Malayness and Islam. In this chapter, I focus my
discussion on two important issues. First, the complex relation between Javaneseness
and Malayness among the Javanese-Singaporean families studied. Second, the
practice of Javaneseness in the wake of rising religiosity among the Muslim of
Singapore, with the case of kuda kepang dance.
Chapter 6 serves as the summary and conclusion of this thesis.


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CHAPTER 2:
THE HISTORY OF JAVANESE IN SINGAPORE

This chapter presents the historical narratives of Javanese people in Singapore.
In particular, I demonstrate how the Javanese migrants came to Singapore and
gradually became an integral part of their host society. In gathering my data for this
chapter, I mainly draw information from the available historical sources as well as
oral history records.
This chapter aims to provide socio-historical context on the presence of
Javanese in Singapore. It basically explores, albeit in general examination, the history
of Javanese-Singaporeans. The discussion on the history of Javanese in Singapore
focuses on several important aspects, such as their origin, their reasons for leaving
their homeland, their migration, as well as their settlement, and their community in
Singapore. Such background information will be indispensable in better
understanding the narratives of present day Javanese-Singaporeans in the following
chapter.
Since this thesis focuses on present day Javanese-Singaporeans – whom
mostly descended from Javanese migrants who moved to Singapore since the
foundation of the first British’s settlement in Singapore up until the enactment of
tighter immigration rules in 1960s – my historical discussion focus, therefore, is
limited to this time period.


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The Javanese Migrants
Javanese migrants in Singapore traced their ancestries back to Java Island.
Their grandparent migrated to Singapore from this major island of Indonesia,
formerly known as the Netherland East Indies. Although all of them came from the
same island, Javanese migrants in Singapore did not come from the same region or
part of Java.
The Javanese mainly inhabits the central and eastern part of the island of Java,

roughly around present day Indonesian provinces of Central Java, Yogyakarta, and
East Java. These three regions were once under the control of the Javanese Kingdom
of Mataram and thus it is commonly associated as the homeland of Javanese people.
But despite being a single kingdom in the past, the Javanese is by no means a
homogenous ethnic group.
Javanese culture differs according to the regional variety in their homeland
(Koentjaraningrat 1990: 21). For example, the Yogyakarta and Surakarta region is
known as the centre of the Javanese court culture, while northern coast of central and
east Java are the domain of pasisir, or coastal culture. Meanwhile, the western most
part of central Java is in the realm of Banyumas culture. Therefore, different regions
have different characteristics, such as their own language dialect and beliefs.
The Javanese speaks Javanese language, with some local variations. Around
the court cities of Yogyakarta and Surakarta, the Javanese language has speech levels
which reflected their paternalistic and hierarchical social system. The pasisir Javanese
speaks the similar language with those from the interior part of Java, albeit with “the
speech level is less involuted” (ibid: 20). Meanwhile, the Javanese from Banyumas


20

area speaks a distinctive Banyumas dialect. Despite this variety, only the dialect
which comes from Yogyakarta-Surakarta area is often considered as the ‘standard’
Javanese.
Javanese belief system, in general, is a mix of Islam with Hindu-Buddhist
influences although the average Javanese would only regard Islam as their religion.
Javanese Islam, however, is the only one of its kind because of its pre-Islamic
influences. Javanese Islam has two manifestations: agami jawi, a syncretism of Islam
with a complex of Hindu-Buddhist beliefs; and agami Islam jawi, which leaning
toward formal Islamic teachings though not entirely lost its Hindu-Buddhist
components (ibid: 317). The syncretistic religion mostly dominates the interior region

of Java while puritan Islam on its coastal areas (c.f. Geertz 1976).

Finding a Better Life in Singapore
The Javanese migrated to Singapore for various different reasons. One of the
prominent reasons is the condition and problems at their homeland. Java is only the
fifth largest island in Indonesian archipelago, yet it is by far the most populous one.
Java population rapidly grew during the nineteenth and early twentieth century
(Pelzer 1946). In 1795, Java’s population was only 3.5 million but by 1895, it was
more than 25 million. In 1930, Java’s population was more than 40 million with
density as high as 316.1 per square kilometers (Widjojo Nitisastro 1970: 75). Thus,
Java became one of the regions in the world with the highest population density
(Holland 1936: 309).


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This huge population created many social problems for Java inhabitants
because the population increase created pressure on cultivable land. This, in turn,
resulted in the creation of “dwarf holdings” which created “growth in the number of
landless agricultural laborers, widespread indebtedness, growth of tenancy, decline in
rural incomes, widespread poverty and malnutrition, and in many districts serious
seasonal food shortages” (Pelzer 1946: 134). Thus, it was not surprising to find that
economic factors, such as the lack of employment opportunities and low income, and
its contingencies, such as poverty and famine, became the main driving force of
Javanese emigration.
On the other hand, the abundant economic opportunities in the thriving port of
Singapore encouraged Javanese migration. Some of the available opportunities for
Javanese migrants were clothes and spices trading, metal and leather crafting,
peddling food, gardening, and other kind of laboring jobs (Li 1989: 94). Some traveler
also mentioned Javanese migrants who became servants, sailors, and gardener in

Singapore (Wallace 1986: 32; Bird 1990: 115; Lockhart 1936: 156). The opening of
plantation estates around Singapore provided even wider opportunities for Javanese
migrants since they required many laborers to run. Indeed, some scholars believed
that rubber plantations in Malaya were one of the most important factors that attracted
large Javanese migration to Singapore (e.g. Marriott 1991: 353).
Yet, economy was not the only reason for Javanese migration to Singapore.
Sometimes, the impetus for migration came from major social or historical events. For
many Javanese in Singapore, the Second World War was a major factor which
affecting their migration. During 1942 – 1945, the Japanese brought and displaced


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thousands of Javanese forced laborers in Singapore (see below). War apparently also
drove some Javanese to leave their homeland because they feared their personal or
family safety. Other times, the Javanese migrated to Singapore because of personal
reasons. One of the examples was marrying Singaporean (see Chapter 3).

The Traders, the Laborers, and the Slaves
The Javanese has been migrating to Singapore since a few years after the
founding of the settlement by the British. One of the earliest accounts which indicated
the presence of Javanese migrants in Singapore dated back in 1822 (Marriot 1991:
345). The same account also mentioned that the Javanese population numbered 38
persons in 1825 (ibid: 341). However, beside some statistical data, there was not
enough information on how the Javanese migrated to Singapore in these early years.
Based on the means of migration, Javanese migration to Singapore may be
roughly divided into three categories: the free migration; the indentured migration;
and the forced migration (Abdul Aziz Johari 1960). Free migration basically happens
when the migrants decide to move to their destination country out of their own free
will. Indentured migration happens when the migrants enter into an agreement which

compels them leave for the destination country. Forced migration happens when the
migrants are forced to move into the destination country.


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Free Migration
Unlike the other two type of migration, Javanese free migration may have
started since the early days of Singapore. However, historical records show that
Javanese free migration became the dominant mode of migration in two time periods:
prior to the introduction of indentured labor system in the early twentieth century and
the post-war years of Singapore.
In early nineteenth century, the main mode of Javanese migration to Singapore
was trough trade. A scholar reported that the earliest Javanese migrants in Singapore
were mainly merchants and traders (Saw 1970: 24). These Javanese traders were
attracted to come for business in Singapore because of its thriving commerce and free
port. Meanwhile, another scholar notes that some Javanese craftsmen and merchants
founded a trading centre in the Kampong Java area around 1850 (Li 1989: 94). These
people produced metal and leather works as well as dealt with trading of clothes,
spices and religious text (ibid).
Another way for Javanese migration to Singapore was through the help of the
middlemen, such as the syaikh haji or pilgrim brokers in Singapore (Span 1994). It
was reported that some middlemen were involved in helping Javanese migrants,
mostly male bachelor, who came to find jobs in Singapore (Li 1989: 94). These
bachelors would usually stay in these middlemen’s residences until they could secure
themselves jobs. Sometimes, the middlemen were their own comrades and relatives.
A report mentioned that some Javanese migrated by using their networks of family
members and friends: they came to Singapore by following their family members or
friends who had successfully made a living in this city (Saw and Cheng 1971: 58).

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Pilgrimage is another means for Javanese to migrate to Singapore. Since the
opening of Suez Canal in 1869 up until the 1930s, Singapore was a transportation hub
for Muslim pilgrim from the archipelago (Vredenbregt 1962: 126). The pilgrims
travelled to Singapore first and then board the steamships to Hejaz from there. In
Singapore, the pilgrim temporarily stayed in Kampong Khaji, near the present day
Kampong Glam. Some would stay longer and work in Singapore with the intention of
earning more money for their trip (Roff 1967: 39). After they conducted their
pilgrimage, some of these Javanese pilgrims decided to abandon their trip back to
their homeland and instead stayed in Singapore and Malaya because they found these
two places to be more prosperous than their homeland (Khazin Mohd Tamrin 1984:
50).
In immediate post-war years, there was large-scale Javanese free migration
from Malaysia to Singapore. Since the beginning of twentieth century, the Malaya
peninsula was already a home to thousands of Javanese migrants and their families
whom worked for rubber plantation estates. Immediately after the war ended, many
“Malaysians” were reported to move to Singapore, presumably with the intention of
making a better living (Chua 1964: 45). Although there was no record on the ethnic
composition of these Malaysian migrants, Li (1989: 95) argued that “a very large
proportion of these post-war migrants were young men or whole families of Javanese
descent.” These people were former Javanese settlers who failed in claiming land for
themselves and thus, they migrated, mostly from Johore, to Singapore in order to find
a better living in this city (ibid).


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The large Javanese migration above marked the end of the boon period of

Javanese migration to Singapore. The post-war immigration policy in Singapore was
stricter to new immigration. The Immigration Ordinance of 1953 limited new
immigration to those who possessed the required skills and qualifications (Saw and
Cheng 1971: 59). This ordinance was amended in 1959 to make immigration policy
even tighter. The amended regulation put more restriction on new migration to
Singapore by imposing minimum monthly salary (ibid). The Immigration Ordinance
of 1953 was still effective when Singapore separated from Malaysia in 1965.
Javanese migration to Singapore from 1960s onward was rather small.
According to the census, there were only 4,694 people of Indonesian born who moved
to Singapore between 1961 and 1970 (Arumainathan 1973). Almost half of these
migrants were women. There was no information on the number of Javanese among
these Indonesian migrants. Regardless, this information gave an indication that the
majority of free migration that happened in this time period was through marriage.

Indentured Migration
Javanese indentured migration started, de facto, with the opening of
plantations estates throughout Malaya in the 1870s. However, the Javanese indentured
labor system officially started in 1900s and lasted until 1930s. This time period also
witnessed large scale Javanese migration to Singapore and Malaya. Most of these
people were indentured laborers working in Malayan rubber plantations. The opening
up of rubber plantation in Malaya was regarded by some scholars, such as Marriott