If I received a research grant to conduct a linguistic study of my target language and culture, I would explore the role of slang in Bahasa Indonesia. In my language class with Farida, we just finished the A1 level, which includes formal constructions. If I received a research grant to conduct a linguistic study of my target language and culture, I would explore the role of slang in Bahasa Indonesia. In my language class with Farida, we just finished the A1 level, which includes formal constructions. We are now starting to learn how teenagers really speak. It turns out that the fewer words, the better. Nouns are often dropped, verbs contracted. For example, instead of saying "Bagaimana kabarmu" Which means how are you the slang version is only "ngamain" Efficiency of communication seems much more important than following structural components. In past blog posts, I’ve talked about how Indonesian is much less structured than German, which is a language I have studied in the past. Learning Indonesian slang adds to this contrast. Indonesian seems more about communicating meaning that creating an orderly form of speech. It’s also probably partially that Bahasa Indonesia is a relatively new language - one that serves as a lingua franca, a common tool of communication, rather than an ancient form of Indonesian culture. Each community has its own language that they probably spend more time preserving.
To conduct my research, I would look compare grammatical structures in Indonesian textbooks, and compare this formal version to how it is spoken in the classroom with slang. For example, I could go to a sports activity and listen to how teenagers speak. I would note which grammatical structures get dropped. In class on Tuesday, we discussed morphemes. I would look for patterns in parts of speech and common root words. It seems that verbs are quite important in Indonesia. While they are not conjugated based on the subject, different suffixes change the meaning of words, which means these added morphemes are therefore derivational - I think. For example, ber- added to the front of the verb means to have. Warna means color, so berwarna means to have color. One could say, "Buku berwarna merah mudah." (The book has the color pink.) I am interested in whether attention to the derivational morphemes continues in slang expressions among Indonesian youth. Ideally, I would love to spend time in Indonesia, doing a kind of ethnographic language research in Indonesian schools. However, if this in-person method were not possible, I could also use social media, which is a place where young Indonesians actively and informally communicate with one another. For this virtual format, I would be able to not only to hear how Indonesians convey meaning through sounds, but also observe writing patterns.
After comparing slang and formal Bahasa Indonesia, I could expand further to see how the Bahasa Indonesia grammatical structures compare with German's formal language and slang. While the formal language speaks to the national values that the country has, Bahasa Indonesia is ultimately a national language that does not capture the diversity among different local communities or the modified slang versions that people actually communicate with throughout their daily lives. By studying slang, I will better understand how Indonesians use the language and the way it shapes their worldview.
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