Chapter 1. Introduction
1.3 Project Significance
proficiency as the school classes are mostly conducted in Chinese. Therefore, to help the OCSs sharpen their Chinese skill and have better preparation, Taiwan institutions provides supplementary training prior to university entrance exams. However, this condition does not apply to other international students from Indonesia that the system provided scholarship was different by the government institution.
1.2 Project Objectives
In the process of this project, photography technique is adapted as a media to display the process of how Indonesians learned their Chinese and also the culture adaptation and communication in Taiwan. As the medium of communication, photography helps researchers in observing and capturing the process of how students adjust in the new environment on learning. Therefore, this study attempts to record the experiences on how Indonesian students adapt to Taiwanese culture, for instance how they spend their time to learn Chinese in Taiwan. Besides observing the process of cultural adaptation through the pictures, this project also observes the challenge that Indonesian students encounter when they are away from their home country, such as the new language barrier and the difference in a new environment.
1.3 Project Significance
In the process of this project, by using photography as a media to represent all the process of how Indonesian students learned and adapt in Taiwan. Photography itself is not only a main way to deliver the story but also interesting for creating the imagination space for audience. McCall and Rhode (1971) in their book said that “Photography with an inspirational purpose, intending to create esthetic and creative stimulation, is also a language or medium of communication” (McCall and Rhode: 1971, p. 4). As the medium
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students adjust to the new environment on learning. Thus with this same assumption, this study tries to record the experiences on how Indonesian students spent their time to learn Chinese in Taiwan meanwhile, they are trying to adapt to Taiwanese culture.Photography (McCall and Rhode, 1971) also has two major divisions; both of which must be mastered:
First, seeing, the awareness of what is significant and meaningful in visual terms, and Craftsmanship, the mastery of the peculiar photographic process of reproducing what was seen (p.2). Second, besides observing the process of cultural adaptation through the pictures, this research also observes the challenge that Indonesian students who they are away with their parents while, facing the new language, in a new environment. It is important to capture the gap between the cultural adaptations. Especially it has four stages in culture shock adaptation which will be faced by Indonesian student, the first phase is honeymoon (contact, optimistic phase, euphoria). This phase occurs when a person experiences interesting situation, euphoria, fascinating events with a new culture and new people he or she encounters. The second is crisis (disintegration, cultural problems, disillusionment, and frustration). Individuals feel disappointed, dissatisfied, and desperate. This phase describes the situation when a person finds the differences between his or her culture and other cultures. The third phase is recovery (reintegration).
People try to learn the language and habits of the new culture. The fourth phase is adjustment (integration, autonomy and independence). In this phase as they can enjoy the new culture, accept the way of life of the other, and get along with the new environment without anxiety (Samovar et al., 2007:335). This is important because of nowadays many
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Indonesian students start to choose to come to Taiwan as one of their choice and this project will contribute on how and what Indonesian student should prepare before coming to Taiwan and also adapt in Taiwanese university life and culture.
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The term of approach is a process, action or approach which were defined in the Indonesian dictionary. While the concept means the plan which is written in paper or design (Kamisa, 1997: 318). The approach can also be interpreted as a strategy, and the concept is an idea or understanding that is abstraction from a concrete event (Ismain, 1996: 28). This chapter will briefly explain about Indonesian culture, Indonesian students and narratives that used in photography.
2.1 Indonesia’s Cultural Background languages and dialects. They shared the identity that has developed, also defined by the national language (Bahasa Indonesia). The religious plurality within Muslim population as a majority. Indonesia’s national motto is, "Bhinneka Tunggal Ika", translated as “Unity in Diversity" that concludes the diversity and shapes the country. The Republic of Indonesia is also located along with the ancient trading routes between South Asia, Far East, and the Middle East, generated in many cultural practices and strongly influenced by a multitude of religions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Islam, and Christianity, all strong in the major trading cities. Figure 1 presents the map of Indonesia.
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Figure 2.1 Map of Indonesia (Washington, D.C.: Central Intelligence Agency, 2002)
According to Everyculture.com (2018), Indonesia has three hundred to four hundred languages which are subgroups of the Austronesian family that have extended from Malaysia through the Philippines, several groups of Taiwan, Vietnam and Polynesia, including the Hawaiian and Maori.
The official language of Indonesia, Bahasa Indonesia, is actually quite similar to Malay language (also known as Bahasa Melayu or Malay). It was recognized as the national language of Indonesia since the congress of Indonesian nationalists in 1928, despite only a small number of people in Sumatra spoke it as in their daily routine. As some of the citizen still speak their native language are Hokkien, Cantonese or Hakkanese. Since then, Bahasa Indonesia is utilized as the language for schools, government, courts, print and electronic media, literary arts, movies, and communication.
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It is increasingly important for younger generation as it shapes the slang language spoken by the youth. Along with some Indonesian native languages are also used outside in multi-ethnic areas, for example in Java. Nowadays, many young people has weakening of native languages, which are rich links to the original cultures, and losing it from modernization, but there is less people to maintain them. The old and last generation of the well-educated Indonesians who could speak original native language had passed away.
Most young and middle-aged people now including the students and teachers of history who did not understand the native language cannot read much of the documented history of the island. Nowadays, because of English is one of international language, therefore the modernization of many generation has to learn English. Due to this reason English is currently used as the official second language, taught in schools and universities with varying degrees of enforcement. (Culture of Indonesia, 2018)
2.1.1 Indonesians in Taiwan
Indonesians in Taiwan had become one of the largest foreign communities in this country, at least we had three categories about Indonesian in Taiwan. They are categorized as students, labor worker and who already married and stay here as a citizen.
There are at least 238,956 people with the citizenship of Indonesia residing in Taiwan as of February 2018 based on the data from the National Immigration agency. This includes 58,993 males and 179,963 females, with 261,250 people come as foreign labors in the data of work development agency, MOL in May 2018. There are some Indonesians with the Chinese ancestry, such as Hakka people have immigrated to Taiwan through international marriage, mostly female, and some have naturalized into Taiwan citizenship.
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married here and become Taiwanese citizen. It’s not much information about Indonesian in Taiwan, I think it will get better and better in the future.2.1.2 Indonesian Students in Taiwan
There are several reasons why international students, including those from Indonesia, decide to pursue further study in Taiwan, such as the academic resources and quality, the diversity of culture, reasonable and affordable tuition, the higher standards of living, the better opportunity for further studies, the availability of scholarships, learning Chinese, is the better opportunity for securing a job back home, and the strategic location of Taiwan as the heart of Asia (FICHET, October 2015).
Taiwan is excellent in various aspect such as academic resources and quality, diversity of culture, and high standard of life that can become their strength in international society. However, international public, including Indonesians, do not get sufficient information about Taiwan, resulting in less exposure of Taiwan’s presence in international public This is one of the reason why there is still limited number of international students, including Indonesian, who pursue their study in Taiwan.
Before the 1990s, the interaction between Indonesia and Taiwan was limited, so it’s difficult to track when Indonesian students first came to Taiwan. However, according to the president of ICATI “during the 1960s there were several Indonesian students who came to Taiwan for study. They were all Overseas Chinese Students (OCS) that pursued degree level or Chinese language study in Taiwan” (Kabinawa, 2013, p. 62). Data compilation about Indonesian students who study in Taiwan started from 1986/1987 when there were 259 Indonesian students studying in Taiwan. Since
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then, the number of Indonesian students has fluctuated between 200 and 250 students from 1986 until 1993. The number increased from 249 in 1993 to 368 in 1994. After that, there was an increase in Indonesian student numbers, reaching more than 1,000 in 1998. However, it decreased from the 2002/2003 school year, but after the 2003/2004 school year, the number of Indonesian students in Taiwan showed a rapid increase.
Based on TETO statistics, as of 2017, 5,074 Indonesian students were studying in Taiwan, including 3,131 degree students at the bachelor, master and doctoral level, 317 exchange students and 1,626 students studying Mandarin.
Table 2.2 Statistics of Indonesian students in Taiwan school year 2000-2016 School Year Total Student
2000/2001 2174
Source: Statistical Summaries provided by the Ministry of Education, ROC Taiwan for International Symposium of PPI Taiwan 2017, Master Thesis of Kabinawa (2013) and Taiwan Economic and Trade Office (TETO) in Jakarta (Adapted from Dilla’s Thesis)
In the year 2000 as marked the first time native Indonesian students studied in Taiwan due to the Taiwan government policy shift to start recruiting foreign students.
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The decrease inIndonesian student numbers during 2002/2003 academic year (the only case when Indonesian student numbers fell below 1,000 from 1999 until 2017) may have been due to Taiwan’s political situation at that time. The significance growth in the number of Indonesian students after the year of 2011 is led by the cooperation between the Indonesia and Taiwan governments. In addition, Indonesians achieve more information about Taiwan and learned about the opportunity to study in Taiwan. Meanwhile, the New Southbound policy embark by the government of President Tsai Ing-wen has had big contributions to increasing Indonesian student numbers started from 2016. According to the Taiwan MOE, Indonesia is the second-largest source of Southeast Asian students in Taiwan after Malaysia. For the 2015/2016 school year, there were 4,394 students from Indonesia, while Malaysia sent 14,946 students and Vietnam 4,043 students. In general, Indonesian students in Taiwan are classified into three different categories. This can be represented from the two major student organizations in Taiwan that I am going to introduce as follows:
1. PPI Taiwan
PPI Taiwan stands for Indonesian Student Association in Taiwan. In Mandarin, this organization is known as “ 台 灣 印 尼 學 生 聯 合 會 ”, while in English
"Indonesian Student Association in Taiwan".
The idea of establishing a Taiwan PPI begins from Hendro Nurhadi, Br. Saiful Arifin, and Br. Agus Muntohar with the Head of IETO Mr. Ferry Yahya in Ramadan 2005. In the discussion, explained by the Head of IETO about the need of
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Indonesian students to form student association, considering the increasing number of Indonesian students in Taiwan.
Various preparations made by Indonesian students at that time have not resulted in the agreement of the formation of PPI Taiwan. Some reasons that cause it, namely:
1. Limitations on the number of students, while preparing for the establishment of a PPI requires considerable effort;
2. Differences of vision-mission vision to be used for PPI-Taiwan;
3. No support from existing Indonesian student organizations.
On the occasion of the 81st Youth Oath, October 27, 2009, PPI NCU (represented by Mr. Hadi Kuntjara) communicated with NTUST ISA / PPI NTUST (represented by Ivan Arista) and PPI Tainan (represented by Vincentius Surya Kurnia Adi and Mrs. Galuh Sudarawerti) about the establishment of PPI-Taiwan.
The communication resulted in an agreement to realize the formation of PPI Taiwan. And finally after the hard work of all Indonesian students PPI was declared on 2 May 2010, coinciding with National Education Day (Hardiknas), at Holistic Building CYCU, Chungli, Taiwan. The declaration charter at the event, signed by the Head of IETO (Indonesian Trade and Economic Office) in Taiwan Mr. Suhartono and Chairman of the Declaration Team Br. Hadi Kuntjara.
2. PERPITA
In 1960, Indonesian overseas Chinese students started to make an organization because there is lack of information for Indonesian overseas Chinese students that
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want to go to Taiwan. PERPITA or in Chinese was called “台灣印尼僑聯誼會”, is the first Indonesia student organization in Taiwan. PERPITA was firstly established in National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) with 35 students in this organization.
This organization starts to grow. PERPITA started to spread info-gathering activities, and was introduced to the new Indonesian Overseas Chinese students.
PERPITA can be established because of the support from Overseas Community Affairs Council Republic of China (OCAC, 2017) that handle all Chinese Overseas Students.
As they started to provide the information to study in Taiwan, the number of Indonesian students in Taiwan has been growing rapidly into 1.923 in 2013. This number is included International degree-seeking, overseas Chinese students (OCS), Chinese Language Center (CLC) students and exchange students. Both international degree seeking students and OCS study in Taiwan for more than 1 year depending on their degree and achievement. Taiwan is also considered successful in developing science and technology, from infrastructure, automotive, transportation, oceanography, and agriculture. This is proved by Taiwan products that goes worldwide. Taiwan's success in education makes Indonesian students who’s interested in studying in Taiwan is increasing from year to year.
Many of Indonesian students in Taiwan struggle in learning and understanding, not only the language, but also the adaptation to the new society and culture. A study by Faradita Prayusti (2013) regarding Indonesian students’ adaptation in Japan found that Indonesian students encountered language barrier in Japan as the local people barely spoke English while the Indonesians were not fluent in
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previously found that the environment here in Taiwan was quite different from my own home. The boards and advertisement along the road were all in Chinese and suddenly I could not speak or read any of that Chinese characters that I had learned back there in Indonesia. I still remembered the first time I came for the class, I hardly understood what the lecturer talked about. All I did was guessing and pretending to know what they were talking about. This started to shock me, even though I majored in Chinese literature for my undergraduate degree. It took around 6 months for me to adapt with the new situation in Taipei during my first semester.Therefore, derived from the aforementioned factors, it is necessary to discuss more about the adaptation process of people with different culture, especially Indonesian students in Taiwan.
Cultural adaptation plays an important role in bridging the cultural gap among the international students. In a journal written by María Assumpta Aneas and María Paz Sandín (2009), entitled Intercultural and Cross-Cultural Communication Research: Some Reflections about Culture and Qualitative Methods, they described intercultural communication as the interaction between individual and groups from different cultures, which influenced how they acted, felt and thought, not to mention how they spoke and listened. They also explained that an intercultural communication could be seen as a different communication process from other cultural background with a challenge that should be overcome in order to achieve effective communication.
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Indonesian students in adapting with different culture and language, the challenges they face, and what they have achieved so far in solving those challenges. The findings contribute as information source for prospective students who will coming to Taiwan.Taiwan is excellence in various field such as academic resources and quality, diversity of culture, and high standard of life that can become their strength in international society. However, international public including Indonesian, did not get sufficient information about Taiwan that cause Taiwan present in international public still limited. This is one of the reason why there is still limited number of international student, including Indonesian, who is studying in Taiwan.
2.2 Cross- Cultural Adaptation
The process of crossing cultures challenges was the very basis of who we are as cultural beings. Young Yun Kim (2001) mentioned about cross cultural adaptation in his book of integrative theory that communication and cross-cultural adaptation were all about adaptation of new culture, offering opportunities for new learning and growth.
Being uprooted from home brings us understanding not only of the people and their culture in the new environment but also about their own personality and their home culture. It is a part of a life changing journey. In addition to that, cross cultural adaptation also as “A process of becoming personal reinvention, transformation, growth, reaching out beyond the boundaries of our own existence. The process does not require that we abandon our former personalities and the cultures into which we were born. Rather, it
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compels us to find ourselves as if for the first time, particularly those “cultural invariants”
within us facets that we hold and refuse to compromise such as enculturation, communication, and cultural adaptation (Neumann, 1992).”
Enculturation is the process when people try to adapt surrounding cultural forces throughout years of socialization. As for Indonesian students when they came here to study they started their adaptation process. Without a doubt, communication also takes part in the enculturation. When the continuous learning the language takes place in individual, it is called a communication. In the process of learning individuals learn to speak, to listen and to understand verbal or non-verbal communication in the way or with whom they usually interact. The cross culture also involved in the enculturation.
Culture itself is a way of thinking and living where one picks up a set of attitudes, values, norms and beliefs that are taught by other members of the group. This set of basic assumptions and solutions to the problems of the world is a shared system that is passed on from one generation to other generation to ensure survival. Furthermore, culture consists of unwritten and written principles and laws that guide how an individual interacts with the outside world.
Members of a culture can be identified by the fact that they share some similarity.
They may be united by religion, by geography, by race or ethnicity. Culture conditions have a certain pattern of thinking, feeling, and behaving in varied social transactions (Young Y. K, 2001). All the varied cultural patterns affect how each person can approach, negotiate and seek communication of his or her own personal and life goals. As Kim (2001) points out, cross-cultural adaptation has been studied seriously since the beginning of the 20th century. According to Kim, one type of literature describes models
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of cross-cultural adaptation. Cross-cultural adaptation refers to how a sojourner chooses to cope with cultural changes. Begley (1999) also defines adaptation as “an umbrella term
of cross-cultural adaptation. Cross-cultural adaptation refers to how a sojourner chooses to cope with cultural changes. Begley (1999) also defines adaptation as “an umbrella term