Talk:Ethnic groups in Indonesia

Foreign ethnicities

Tried to clean up this section. Please check to see if I got it correct. Kortoso (talk)

ISLANDS AND PEOPLES OF THE INDIES By RAYMOND KENNEDY

http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/ref/SI/NEI/

Rajmaan (talk) 04:04, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

Terminology

Hi all,

I want to create a consensus here about how to refer to certain languages and/or ethnic groups in Indonesia in the English Wikipedia. While this is not a hot topic, it still is important to keep up precision and common usage here on WP.

1. Constituent order: "Toba Batak" vs. Batak Toba

In English grammar, adjectives and similar qualifiying modifiers generally precede the head. This also applies to regional or sub-ethnic specifications to a broader cover term. Undisputed examples for this are "Jambi Malay" or "Cirebon Javanese". "Malay" and "Javanese" are the English equivalents to Indonesian Melayu and Jawa when used as an adjective or referring to the people. So the modifier "Jambi" and "Cirebon" precede the English terms, while the Indonesian equivalents of course follow the strucure head—modifier, as in Melayu Jambi and Jawa Cirebon. I think everyone will agree up to here (although I occasionally encounter things like "Malay Ambonese" here on WP, and immediately correct them).

There is a limited number (but see 2. below for other tendencies) of ethnic groups and regions which have a distinct adjective in English: Malay, Javanese, Sundanese, Madurese, Buginese, Butonese, Moluccan, just to name a few. But for many others, the common English term is identical to the Indonesian term, e.g. English "Batak" = Indonesian Batak, "Dayak" = Dayak, "Minangkabau" = Minangkabau, "Kaili" = Kaili etc. If we add a modifier to one of these common English terms to specify region or sub-ethnicity, this modifier naturally – according to English grammar rules – precedes the modifier, e.g. "Toba Batak", "Karo Batak", "Ngaju Dayak" etc., in the same way we say e.g. "Ulster Scots", "First Mesa Hopi", "Batanggas Tagalog", "Hokkaido Ainu", "Tzotzil Maya" etc. Now, the Indonesian euqivalents of "Toba Batak", "Karo Batak", "Ngaju Dayak" are Batak Toba, Batak Karo, Dayak Ngaju. Because of the opposite constituent order, the English usage may sound somehow "wrong" to Indonesian ears even for proficient L2-speakers of English. As a consequence, the Indonesian forms are increasingly used in English texts, including WP articles (e.g. Batak Karo language), and nota bene without italics, but as if they were common English terms. (Some of these forms are even propagated by Ethnologue and Glottolog.)

I want to advocate here to stick to the established English usage, and to make it a sort of style-guide for Indonesia-related articles. This will also involve a few page moves (e.g. Batak Karo language).

(Now please don't get me wrong. Of course I won't claim that "kabuli nasi" is correct English for nasi kabuli; "kabuli nasi" is wrong, since nasi is not an English word ("kabuli rice" is the correct translation). Neither do I object to muffin stroberi, which sounds odd to English ears, but since muffin has become a commonly used loanword in Indonesian, modifiers can freely follow Indonesian grammar rules.)

2. All these "knees"

Above I have said that the number of ethnic groups and regions which have a distinct adjective in English is limited. Some Indonesians have a different view, and propagate the indiscrimimate usage of the ending "-nese" as a kind of productive suffix with any Indonesian region or ethnicity, resulting in neologisms such as "Bataknese", "Dayaknese", "Tolakinese" etc. I consider these forms just wrong and strongly advocate against their use in Wikipedia.

The question of "-ese" (not "-nese"!) is actually a tricky one. Arguably, this suffix is k.o. semi-productive, as we can see from the rather late coinages of "Trukese" and "Gilbertese" in the Pacific Ocean, or from mock formations like "consultantese" or "journalese". However, it is not common and definitely not automatically applied in English, as we can see from its total absence in the ethnic names of Native Americans in the US, or the regional languages in the Philippines; nobody says "Hopinese" or "Visayanese". The English use of "-ese" in "Javanese", "Sundanese" (and of course also "Chinese", "Japanese") ultimately was adopted from the nomenclature of Romanic-speaking (Italian, Spanish, Portugese) explorers and geographers. The latter applied the same rules as in their Mediterranean home, e.g. by adding a euphonic "n" after vowels ("Java-n-ese"), or dropping a vowel considered to be an "ending" ("Madur-ese"). The Dutch also adopted the suffix in the shape "-eesch" (old spelling), which was semi-produtive and competed with the native Dutch suffix "-sch" (e.g. Soendaneesch was used next to Soendaasch). The number of these formations, however, is historcally determined and finite. Neologisms such as "Bataknese" are therefore wrong (and btw. the post-consonantal "n" almost sound cacophonic to me).

I seek your opinion about these two points for a potential consensus.

I am not an Anglo-English native speaker, so I don't to want to unilaterally impose British/American/Australian standards on the increasingly pluricentric English language. And even though Indonesia is not part of the pluricentric Anglosphere, but – luckily, I would say – has maintained its linguistic independence, it might be that in the future, Indonesian-coined neologisms will eventually become more prevalent than the traditional "correct" forms. But at the present stage, I would want to see WP not as a driving force for this replacment. That is why I want to invite editors from Indonesia, but also from all over the world, including native English speakers, to this discussion. I ping Jeblat, Masjawad99, Davidelit, Hddty., Merbabu, AdaCiccone, Obsidian Soul, Mimihitam all of whom recently have made edits on Indonesian topics related to this question. –Austronesier (talk) 15:16, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Philippine grammar is generally identical to English grammar in which the modifier precedes the element being modified, so this isn't a problem in our articles. It is always "Batangas Tagalog" (or "Batangueño Tagalog"), never "Tagalog Batangas" (unless you are indicating that the province of Batangas is Tagalog). The exceptions are adjectives, whose association relies on suffixes/linking modifiers and remains grammatically correct even reversed (e.g. malaking puno or malaki na puno = punong malaki or puno na malaki, "big tree"); as well as Spanish-derived names which have fossilized word orders (e.g. Spanish "Negros Oriental" = English "Oriental Negros"/"Eastern Negros").

That said, I still agree with the proposal, since in this case, the usage seems to be due to a misconception that they are Indonesian, rather than English.

I also agree strongly with avoiding the [mis]use of "-nese" in ethnic/language names that do not historically have them. It's just wrong. In our case, in the absence of a historically notable names, the name of the ethnic group is always identical to the name of their language in English sources, e.g. Tagalog people = Tagalog language; Masbateño people = Masbateño language; Cebuano people = Cebuano language. And yeah, the Tagalog language would never be referred to as "Tagalogese", in the same way that it's always "Filipino"/"Filipina" or "Philippine", never "Filipinese" or "Philippinian" or whatever.-- OBSIDIAN†SOUL 17:32, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

• Agree with both points. Especially the second part, since the usage of -ese is not common either in English or in Indonesian (obviously). The first one can still be understood, but the second one is just plain wrong. Also, I am not sure about this, but we have, for example, Makassar people, Makassarese language, and Makassan contact with Australia. All three names are found in the literature, albeit sometimes with different connotations (Makassar for the ethnic group, Makassarese for the language, Makassans/Macassans for a diverse group of sailors based in Makassar). In this case, should we keep the current terms, or change the latter two to Makassar? Note that the language is often referred to as Makassar (with no -ese) as well. Masjawad99^💬 18:04, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Masjawad99, Obsidian Soul for your input! Three out of three is 100% consensus, but I think we should wait for a higher turnout. Maybe another editor will stumble into this discussion. Essentially, I think my suggestion is supported by WP:ESTABLISHED.

Regarding the example mentioned by Masjawad99 (Makassar vs. Makassarese), there are a few languages/ethnic groups for which more than one name is common in established English usage, e.g. Bugis/Buginese (but never **Bugisnese), Tengger/Tenggerese. In such cases, mentioning the variant in the beginning of the lead is sufficient, plus all the necessary redirects. Cleanups within articles should be made, but cleanups across articles for the sake of consistency should be brought to the respective talk pages. That's just IMHO, of course. In the case of Makassar vs. Makassarese, the linguist Anthony Jukes has advocated for the distribution which you have mentioned, although Makassarese is actually just as correct and commonly used for the ethnic group. –Austronesier (talk) 15:27, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

Beware the 'one size fits all brigade' who have no native knowledge of the languages of south east asia who may in fact be concerned that the decisions or consensus arrived at in terminology might not fit with the larger senses of what appropriate pages in WP:MOS might have to offer.

Also from my experience with most usage inside the Indonesian project, is that many times an editor will wander into an article or small range of articles, then change to suit their world view of how something is used, make their mark and are never seen again. Typically it occurs in the very circular roundabout of edit history of the spelling of the names of the first two presidents of Indonesia, - the oe or the u.

Also as my fieldwork in Java was located in proximity of the yogya and solo cultural spheres, the whole extra dimension of translating in and out of javanese, and the revival of javanese script has also created a bit of a potential minefield of script turning up in english articles, repeated and sometimes grossly over- used.

Which leads to the focus required in all of this - this is the english encyclopedia, and the expected reader is an english reader with no knowledge of the languages or scripts of the groups of people of Indonesia - there is a real need to clarify and understand why editors who are native speakers of the languages of Indonesia need to have to have things that are neither understood or comprehended in articles for an english medium. JarrahTree 13:58, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Agree with Austronesier's second point. If agreed, we can add the following guidance into MOS:INDONESIA:

Following WP:COMMONNAME, the commonly used English names should be used for Indonesian ethnic groups, e.g. Javanese, Batak, or Malay. Note that the -ese suffix is used for some ethnic group when appropriate (for example Javanese, Madurese) but it is not necessary (for example no need to write Batak as Bataknese). If there is no known English name, the name in Indonesian should be used without any suffix, for example example here.

Other suggestion welcome. For the first point, I am neutral. In my view, there are two ways to interpret it, (1) the words "Batak" and "Karo" are transformed into English individually therefore the order needs to be reversed, or (2) the compound is transformed as a whole therefore the original order remains. For "Jambi Malay" it is obvious that (1) is happening because "Malay" is used instead of "Melayu" but it's not obvious that 1 is happening for Batak Karo. (2) happens in your nasi kebuli example, or even names of ethnic groups like Orang Laut. It seems can be argued either way, therefore I do not have any opinion. HaEr48 (talk) 04:05, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

@HaEr48: Thank you for your suggestion. I'm thinking of rephrasing a little to emphasize that this is about established usage. As for the first point, I shouldn't have gone too much into theoretical details; actually it is also about established usage. "Toba Batak", "Ngaju Dayak" etc. are long-established English terminology. In cases of doubt, usage in English sources should be followed – if they exist; per default, the Indonesian term always should be adopted, without modification. –Austronesier (talk) 16:09, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

@Austronesier: If the argument is about established English usage, then I agree, per WP:COMMONNAME. HaEr48 (talk) 01:33, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• Early stages of the Austronesian diaspora showing best-fit genomic proportions of Austronesian-speaking peoples in ISEA and their inferred population movements.png

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 12:52, 8 September 2020 (UTC)

Census data vs. academic secondary sources

@Northheavensky: The WP policy on what sources to use is quite clear:

• WP:PSTS: Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published secondary sources and, to a lesser extent, on tertiary sources and primary sources.
• WP:SCHOLARSHIP: Articles should rely on secondary sources whenever possible [...] When relying on primary sources, extreme caution is advised. Wikipedians should never interpret the content of primary sources for themselves.

Ananta et al. (2015) is such a scholarly secondary source, whereas the census report from the BPS is a primary source, see WP:NOR, note c:

• Further examples of primary sources include: [...] census results....

If you want to add the figures from BPS, you should provide a secondary source that equals Ananta et al. (2015), which is written by subject-matter experts and published by a publishing partner of Cambridge University Press.

This does not mean that BPS data is not reliable. Where no academic secondary sources exist, BPS data is the best information we have, and is therefore also used in many articles. But if a secondary source is available that presents the data from an academic subject-matter expert angle, WP policies advise us to use the latter.

If you want to get third-party input about this matter, you can consult Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard. –Austronesier (talk) 16:03, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

Austronesians vs. Melanesians

The second sentence of the lede says:

• The vast majority of those belong to the Austronesian peoples, with a large minority being Melanesians.

Do we really want to have this simplistic and misleading sentence in the opening paragraph, which suggests a clear-cut dichotomy between two categories that actually do not exist and which is not supported by the sources?

Modern scholarship does not taxonimize the ethnic diversity of Indonesia in such a manner. The "standard model" of the settlement of Maritime SE Asia, which was mostly developed by Peter Bellwood and is described e.g. in Taylor (2003) (one of the sources erroneously cited for the current text), posits two major population sources for the ethnic groups of Indonesia, the "Australomelanesians" who inhabited the archipelago for tens of thousands of years, and the "Austronesians" who arrived in the archipelago ca. 4000BP, bringing Austronesian languages and rice farming to Indonesia. The newly arrived population interacted with the earlier inhabitants, and as a consequence, many ethnic groups of Indonesia (especially from Sulawesi and NTB eastwards) carry both Austronesian and Australomelanesian ancestry to various levels. Some still speak non-Austronesian languages, many speak Austronesian languages. But how do you "classify" ethnicities from this? Modern descriptions of the ethnic diversity of Indonesia don't do it. Historical ancestry sources and modern ethnic groups are two different things.

Things have even become more complicated by the fact that evidence from population genetics and archeology has indentified a third major source for the population of Indonesia, which arrived via the SE Asian mainland and has a genetic profile that links them to present-day Austroasiatic speakers. The major ethnic groups of western Indonesia (including Javanese, Sundanese, Malays) have high levels (up to 50%) of this ancestry, and it is found in lower levels also in eastern Indonesia.

I suggest to remove the second sentence entirely or to replace with a line that mentions the diverse historical origins of the ethnic groups of Indonesia (but not in the opening paragraph; maybe as an extension to the third paragraph). Austronesier (talk) 14:59, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

European Remnant/ Diaspora/Expats?

The Lead Sentence says there are 1340 Officially Recognized Groups. Though the linked source is in Indonesian. In such a long list, is there any mention of Europeans? Are they recognized as a Minority? Or are any such Europeans regarded as foreign nationals. Or is there an Official ban on European Migration/Citizenship?

It's interesting to note, since the End of (European) Colonialism, the completely disappearance of Europeans worldwide (South Africa being the lone exception, for now), countries of over a Billion (China, India) over 200 Million (South/S.E. Asia: Indonesia, Bangladesh, Pakistan) have only a few thousand expats at most, with maybe a few hundred thousand ephemeral tourists flickering in & out of view like fireflies.2603:7080:CB3F:5032:8954:43A9:1656:D57E (talk) 21:45, 4 April 2023 (UTC)