ID IN MA YAN AN
of t
FACULTY SATYA W
IDEOLOGY AND HEGEMONY
AND ORANG MISKIN DILARANG SEKOLAH
THESIS
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment f the Requirements for the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan
Rieka Ayunidya Suci 112008116
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
Y OF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE WACANA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY
SALATIGA 2013
IDEOLOGY AND HEGEMONY
IN MA YAN AND ORANG MISKIN DILARANG SEKOLAH
THESIS
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement of the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan
Rieka Ayunidya Suci 112008116
Approved by:
Lany Kristono, M.Hum Suzana Maria L.A.F., M.Hum
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IDEOLOGY AND HEGEMONY IN MA YAN AND ORANG MISKIN DILARANG SEKOLAH
Rieka Ayunidya Suci ABSTRACT
Education is considered an important element that determines one’s social status, although there are uneducated people who are successful. Such an idea about the importance of education is also reflected in Ma Yan and Orang Miskin Dilarang Sekolah. This is interesting because the main characters were still in elementary school. They even believed that education was the only way to help them get out of the trap of poverty. Therefore this study tried to find out what ideologies and hegemony were behind the characters’ attitude toward education in both novels. The analysis revealed that their strong belief about education was rooted in culture, religious belief, parents’ belief about education as reflected in family upbringing as well as their dream to get out of the trap of poverty. The findings are expected to make the readers understand why people may think that education is important and how ideologies are calculated.
Keyword: ideology, hegemony, education
INTRODUCTION
The Indonesian society is characterized by, among others, the contrasting conditions of the upper and lower classes as reflected in their belongings and life style. The upper class’ better financial condition makes the group have bigger opportunities to make use of different public facilities and select the best for them than the lower class. For example, they have more power to access the best education, because they can afford it easily. In contrast, the lower class should struggle to get particularly higher-level education because of financial reason. As a result, they will probably remain in that social class.
seems to be the most important one because it enables people to get a better job. A good job means a high income, which is related to social prestige. In this era of information, education seems to play a more important role as a determining factor of one’s future. It is generally believed that the lower class people have to be well-educated to enter the higher social class. The struggle of children in remote areas, who often have to walk several kilometers, cross a river or pass a jungle or an emergency bridge, to go to school, reflects what education means for them. Article 31 of the 1945 Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia which states that all children in Indonesia have the same right to get education, the government program of 9 year mandatory educational system and the establishment of “Gerakan Indonesia Mengajar” (Indonesia Teaching Movement) confirm that education is important.
On the contrary, the world at present also witnesses the success of uneducated people. Contrast to the phenomenon of parents’ belief about education and the importance of education is the phenomenon of successful ‘uneducated’ entrepreneurs. Sean Parker, who invented facebook, earned US$ 2.1 billion. His success in developing facebook is because he likes technology since he was child. The late Steve Job and Bill Gates, two influential names in computers and softwares, did not finish their college education. Peter Firmansyah who owns the international label of clothing, ‘Peter Says Denim’, started his business since he couldn’t continue his study to the university because of the high tuition. However, the belief that education is important is still strongly held.
good job, which in turns makes a better life. Both novels also depict the struggle of the main characters, which are from the lower class, to be educated. This is interesting since the protagonist of Ma Yan is a third-grade of elementary school who lived in Zhangjiashu. On the other hand, the main character of Anak Miskin Dilarang Sekolah is a third-grade and first-grade elementary school students living in Kampung Genteng, Semarang. It is rather unusual that young children have such an understanding about education. Therefore, this study would like to examine what ideologies are behind the main characters’ struggle to be formally educated and how the ideologies are inculcated.
Through this study, it is hoped that the readers will understand more about the reason(s) why education is considered important. As prospective teachers, the readers, who are the students of the Faculty of Language and Literature, Satya Wacana Christian University, may learn about what education means for some people, particularly those of the lower class. Besides, the readers are also expected to be aware of how ideologies may be inculcated in people. Finally, reading the research report, the readers are expected to have a deeper understanding of the Marxist theory used in this study.
My search for the previous studies done related to this research reveals that there has been no research discussing ideology and hegemony in Ma Yan and Anak Miskin Dilarang Sekolah. So far, the results of my investigation are in the form of reader’s review about the
novels.
Marxism
simply sell their labour power in the market place of capitalism, or the poor. Marxists divides a society into two big categories; i.e. the poor (proletariat) and the rich (bourgeoisie) (Tyson 54).
The aim of Marxism is to bring about a classless society, based on the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange (Barry 158). Marxism sees progress as coming about through the struggle for power between different social classes. To Karl Marx, people’s social class membership is determined by their relationship to the means of production, that is, by what they do within a society’s way of producing goods and services. Marx sees two classes, capitalists and workers. Capitalists own the means of production (factories, businesses, etc.) and workers labor in them. So there is a big difference in the social class between the higher class as a capitalist and lower class as a worker (“Culture and Social Class” 2).
All the same, Marxist literary criticism maintains that a writer’s social class, and its prevailing “ideology” (outlook, values, tacit assumption, half-realised allegiances, etc) have a major bearing on what is written by a member of that class (Barry 158). Marxist theory uses the notion of ideology to describe the process through which the dominant ideas within a given society reflect the interests of a ruling economic class (Stoddart 192).
Ideology
“Ideology is a process accomplished by the so- called thinker, consciously indeed but with a false consciousness. The real motives impelling him remain unknown to him; otherwise it would not be an ideological process at all. Hence he imagines false or apparent motives. Because it is a process of thought he derives both its form and its content from pure thought, either his own or that of his predecessors.” (qtd. in Williams 65).
Some Marxists use the concept of false consciousness to explain how the Proletariat is co-opted by a ruling class into the values of Capitalist society (a member of the working class is falsely conscious of their true class position when they fail to see themselves as a member of an exploited, oppressed, class). False consciousness is a concept derived from Marxist Theory of social class. It refers to the systematic misrepresentation of dominant social relations in the consciousness of subordinate classes (workers, peasants, serfs).
Ideology itself is idea that comes from the society that serves the interest of a class in the society. As Nielsan says, “An ideology . . . is a system of ideas, theories, beliefs, attitudes, norms, and social practices that (a) is characteristic of a class society or of a class or other primary social group in a class society and that (b) serves principally the interests of a class, typically a class in that society, or other primary social group while typically at least, putting itself forward as answering to the interests of the whole of the society” (98). What makes ideas exist in a society is the influence of the dominant people within that society. Similarly Richard says that an ideology “is systematically distortive and reflects reified powers of domination” (109).
power”. The statement about social power is supported with Althusser idea who said that ideology represent the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of existence. For example, in a religious society, a human being knows about his duties but he does not know about his right, because the religious ideology establishes a kind of imaginary consciousness which distances a human being from his real conditions.
Hegemony
Hegemony is a concept which at once includes and goes beyond culture as a whole social process. Hegemony is not only the communicative upper level of ideology, nor are its forms of control only those ordinarily seen as manipulation or indoctrination (Williams 108-110). It also goes beyond ideology. It means that hegemony is a concept or idea that influenced not only by culture but also the circumstances. What is decisive is not only the conscious system of ideas and beliefs, but the whole lived social process as practically organized by specific and dominant meanings and values (William 109). Gramsci also states that hegemony appears as the “common sense” that guides our everyday, unexciting understanding of the world. According to William, it is a view of the world that is “inherited from the past and uncritically absorbed” and which tends to reproduce a sort of social homeostasis, or “moral and political passivity” (333).
"A lived hegemony is always a process. It is not, except analytically, a system or a structure. It is a realised complex of experiences, relationships and activities, with specific and changing pressures and limits. In practice, that is, hegemony can never be singular. Its internal structures are highly complex, as can readily be seen in any concrete analysis. Moreover (and this is crucial, reminding us of the necessary thrust of the concept), it does not just passively exist as a form of dominance. It has continually to be renewed, recreated, defended, and modified. It is also continually resisted, limited, altered, challenged by pressures not at all its own" (William 112).
The concept of hegemony goes beyond the ideology and it is not only the conscious system of ideas and beliefs but also the social process that organized by specific dominant meanings and values. Ideology also a kind of normal sense and articulated system of meaning, values and beliefs (William 106).
The importance of education
Education is understood differently by the characters in both novels. If the main and secondary characters in Ma Yan (hereafter MY) consider education important, the secondary characters in Orang Miskin Dilarang Sekolah (hereafter OMDS) consider the opposite. The characters in both novels have the same background of life, i.e. they are poor. However, the characters in MY believe that education can help them eradicate poverty. In contrast, most characters in OMDS believe that education is not important because it is better for them to work hard to fulfill their daily needs rather than going to school.
save her pocket money for two weeks to buy the pen, although it only cost two Yuan (China currency). Every week, Ma Yan got one yuan to buy extra food or stationery at school but she saves all the money so that she could buy the pen (Kuncoro 65). This means for two weeks she only had a bowl of rice for breakfast at school. This shows how much she wants to study and how determined she is to be able to go to school. The only reason why Ma Yan thinks that education is more important than having meals is what she thinks she will enjoy in the future if she is educated. She believes that education drives her to a better life. It is reflected in MaYan’s note that says about her hope. She has to study hard so that she can enter to the university someday and get good job so their parents will not be have a miserable life (Kuncoro 66).
In Anak Miskin Dilarang Sekolah, only one protagonist, Faisal, a third-grade elementary student, considers education significant, as reflected in what he said to his good friends, Yudi, Pepeng and Pambudi. These three boys did not go to school because they had to help their parents work. Their parents worked in Yok Ben farm. They had to look for the grass for the cows, cleaned the farm and toke care all cows everyday (Prasetyo 17). What Faisal says to his good friends about going to school expresses his idea about education.
“Banyak hal yang bisa kita dapatkan dengan sekolah, selain untuk masa depan yang lebih baik, sekolah bisa mengendalikan imajinasi-imajinasi liar ke kehidupan Kampung Genteng yang begitu menggoda”. (Prasetyo 68)
“We can get a lot of things by going to school. Besides giving a better future, school can also control the wild-imaginations to the Kampung Genteng which is so tempting”. (My own translation)
parents and teachers, or what he reads. This is ideological since the idea itself reflects the process of production idea in social life (Eagleton 1).
Similarly, since Ma Yan, is also still in the third grade of elementary school, what she thinks of education cannot be completely her own idea. Ma Yan seems to be inspired by what her parents do to send her to school. To fulfill the daily needs, pay the school tuition and give the pocket money, Ma Yan’s parents worked very hard. Her father went to Yinchuan (the capital of Ning Xia) or to Hohhot in Mongolia or Sansu and Shaanxi to get more job in order to earn more money. Her mother also went to Ning Xia to work in fa cai farm as a fa cai; i.e. a terrestrial cyanobacterium, a type of photosynthetic bacteria that is used as a vegetable in Chinese cuisine) picker. That shows Ma Yan parents struggle to earn money for their family.
It is her family’s financial condition that makes Ma Yan think that she has to get a good job, as stated in the following quotation:
“Ayah dan ibu rela mengorbankan segalanya agar kami bisa tetap bersekolah. Aku harus belajar super giat untuk masuk universitas suatu hari nanti. Setelahnya, aku akan mendapat pekerjaan yang bagus. Ibu dan Ayah tidak akan lagi hidup sengsara. Itulah tujuan hidupku. Itulah pengharapanku”. (Kuncoro 66)
“Dad and mom have sacrificed everything so that we can go to school. I have to study very hard to go to the university someday. Afterwards, I will get a good job. They will not have miserable life. That’s the purpose and wish in my life”. (My own translation)
dominating Ma Yan’s family so that it becomes ideological. As Campbell and Kean explain, ideology is “those modes of feeling, valuing, perceiving and believing that exist within and inform our everyday lives and connect us to wider structures of power in society in ways that contribute to the maintenance and reproduction of social power” (9). Ma Yan’s parents’ hard work to pay for their children’s tuition and Ma Yan’s belief that education is the only way to earn much money show that they are victims of the hegemony of the ideology that education is significant.
At school, Ma Yan sees that her friend, whose parent work as a government officer always give their children pocket money. When her friend asks her to accompany her to the market, she saw that her friend can buy anything she wants, such as candy, bread, pencil and handkerchief (61). As a government officer, they get fixed salary so they can give their children pocket money every season. On the contrary, Ma Yan cannot buy anything.
Besides, a song entitled “Ketika Harus Kau ucapkan Selamat Tinggal” (“We have to say good bye”) that her mother taught her reminds her of her parents’ endeavor to earn money to pay
for her school tuition. The song is about parents’ advice to the children that someday the children will have their own life and they do not need to worry about their parents and home.
“Ingatan (tentang lagu) ini membuatku ingin terus bersekolah dan bisa masuk universitas sehingga memungkinkan aku mendapatkan pekerjaan yang hebat. Pekerjaan yang hebat itu akan memberiku penghasilan besar dan tetap sehingga bisa kubelanjakan untuk segala keperluan hidup. Maka ibuku akan memiliki kehidupan yang bahagia”. (Kuncoro 52)
The song makes Ma Yan remember her mother’s struggle because her mother was the first person who taught her that song, so that she always remembers her when she sings that song. Ma Yan seems to have been moved, remembering that she will leave her parents and hometown later. She may have a much better life than her parents, who have had a lot of difficulties for her future. Ma Yan may think that she has to do something to express her thankfulness for what her parents have done for her and it becomes her motivation to study hard.
Ma Yan’s attitude reflects Bornstein, Tal and Tamis-LeMonda’s statement that parents in collectivist cultures, such as Japan and China, encourage children to obey rules and to behave conforms to norms; i.e. obedience and proper behavior, with respect for the elder. This means how Ma Yan thinks of and perceives her life is a part of her culture. In other words, Chinese culture considers it is natural for children to pay for what their parents have done to them. As a result, Ma Yan’s determination to study hard in order to make her mother have a happy life reflects how culture influences the hegemony.
On the other hand, OMDS relates education, social status and God as reflected in what Faisal said to his friends in the quotation below:
“Maksudnya, dengan sekolah, Allah akan mengangkat derajat kalian. Ilmu akan membuat orang disegani, tetapi orang bodoh akan selalu terhina di mana pun berada”. (Prasetyo 72)
“I mean, if we school, God will raise your status. Science will make people be respected, but stupid people will always be insulted anywhere they are”. (My own translation)
you and those who is given knowledge This is one factor which may shape Faisal’s idea about education as well as differ him from Ma Yan, who learns about the importance of education from her daily experience. By quoting Al Mujadalah verse 11 to make his friends realize the importance of education, Faisal is using the verse as a means of hegemony (Gramsci qtd. in William 333).The verse becomes ideological because it shapes an idea as if education is the only way for one to get a higher social status so that it is a false consciousness.
Pepeng, Pambudi and Yudi do not realize that education is important because their parents do not ask them to go to school and talk about it. They think that working and earning money is the important thing than education (Prasetyo 53). Their poor condition makes their parents and they believe that they have to work and earn money to continue their life. Their parents have such an opinion because the poverty itself so to them what is important is to be able to eat. It is also stated as Faisal thought in page 167. In the quotation above, Faisal realize that money is important, of course with the high education and it is different with his friends who think that they can get money even though they uneducated.
“Aku belajar satu hal lagi, kehidupan yang aku tinggali ini semua serba materi, semua diukur dengan uang, semua berbau uang, semua tak bisa dipisahkan dari uang. Konon, tanpa uang kita tak bisa apa-apa. Banyak nilai yang telah tergerus dan hanya menjadi petaka, karena ketergantungan mereka dengan uang.” (Prasetyo 167)
“I learned one more thing; the life I live in is all about material. All things measured with money, cannot be separated from money. It was said that without money we can’t do anything. All the value lost and become a catastrophe, because of their addiction in money.” (My own translation)
psychiatrist to get money, just sit and listen the patient story and the reason of it is education (166). Education makes people get a better job and of course a high salary and good life. The psychiatrist absolutely has a high education so she/he can get money easily. In this case, Faisal also learns from his experience.
It is interesting that the parents in both novels view education differently. In OMDS, the parents, except Faisal’s parents, do not think that education is important. On the other hand, Ma Yan’s parents do what they can to send their children. The parents in OMDS may not think that education can change their life because they accept their life, including the poverty. This attitude may be rooted in culture. In Javanese culture, people are supposed to be submissive, to accept things as they are. As Mulder said, that ethnic behaviour has lead to the nrimo attitude, because people have to pursue the ensuing 'slamet, tentrem, lan ayem', i.e. blessedness, quietness, peacefulness (Mulder 1996).
In terms of social stratification, the Javanese distinguish between two broad social levels,
wong cilik (or common people), consisting of peasants and the urban lower classes, and the
priyayi (or high-class society), comprising civil servants, intellectuals, and the aristocracy
(Koentjaraningrat 1957). It shows that wong cilik always obedient to the priyayi. In this case, the Faisal’s friend’s parents are the wong cilik and Yok Ben is the priyayi. It also influences their children thinking. Wong cilik idea influences the children thinking because the culture makes them obedience to the priyayi so the only thing they should do is working to them. In OMDS novel, Faisal’s friend’s parents who determine as a wong cilik doesn’t like the three boys who go to school. The reason is if they go to school and be smart, they cannot be a slave.
“Ah, damn, they go to school now, it’s so serious, if they go to school and be smart…” (My own translation)
Instead of going to school, Pambudi, Pepeng and Yudi have to help their parents earn a living (Prasetyo 64-65). That is their struggle to get education beside the poverty.
“Ya, aku sih iri Sal, tapi mau bagaimana lagi, aku harus bekerja membantu ayah. Mengangkati rumput-rumput untuk makanan sapi-sapi,” kata Pambudi sambil menundukkan wajahnya... (Prasetyo 64)
“Yeah, I’m jealous Sal, but I have to help my Dad. Lifting the grass for the cows, said Pambudi.”
“Aku sendiri setiap sore harus berkeliling kampung menjual pisang goreng ke rumah-rumah di Kampung Genteng,... Kali ini Yudi yang bicara. (Prasetyo 64)
“Me too. I have to walk around sell the fried banana door to door every afternoon, said Yudi.”
“Kalau aku, setiap malam diajak ayah untuk mengangkuti kelapa-kelapa dari pelabuhan ke pasar-pasar malam dengan becak sejauh 25 kilo... Pepeng yang bicara. (Prasetyo 65)
“And me, my Dad asked me to lift the coconut from the port to the night market use the pedicab as long as 25km every evening.”
“Aku dan kamu hidup dalam dunia yang lain, Sal. Hidupmu enak, semua kebutuhanmu tercukupi, tetapi aku... aku harus berjuang untuk menyambung nasibku agar tidak kelaparan”. (Prasetyo 65)
“You and I have different life. Your life is nice, all your needs fulfilled, but I … I have to work hard to continue my life so that I am not hunger.” (My own translation)
not think that education is important because they reflect their parents’ beliefs in education.
In effect, Faisal has to talk a bit rudely to make his friends realize the importance of education.
“Apa kau ingin jadi pencari rumput selamanya, apa kau juga ingin menjadi penjual pisang goreng dan kuli pengangkut kelapa selamanya, seperti orang tua Kalian yang membanting tulang begitu kerasnya, tetapi hasilnya... apa? Mereka tetap seperti budak...,” kataku begitu keras dan mengena di ulu hati.” (Prasetyo 70)
“Do you want to be a grass seeker, a fried banana seller, and a coconut carrier forever? Like your parents who work very hard, but the result... they remain as a slave, I said rudely.”
“Aku juga bosan dengan keadaan ini terus menerus Sal, aku ingin keluar dari jerat kemiskinan ini. Yudi albino membuang kekesalan itu dari dalam hatinya.” (Prasetyo 71)
“I’m bored with this condition Sal, I want to go out from this poverty. Said Yudi in a disappointment.” (My own translation)
What Faisal says reflects his belief about education. Just like Ma Yan, Faisal believes that education is a tool to have a comfortable life. Moreover, Faisal thinks that hard work without education cannot improve one’s life. In other words, education is the only way to go out of poverty. Faisal’s idea is supported by Yudi’s statement that he is bored living in such a condition, which implies that all his life, he is poor. Because his parents are not educated, his family is poor.
existence” (Althusser 167). The idea is also ideological because it reflects a false consciousness (Eagleton 69).
Ma Yan puts her hope in education so much so that she dares to express her disagreement with her parents. When Ma Yan’s parent decided to stop her schooling because they don’t have enough money to pay for Ma Yan and her brother’s school fees, Ma Yan refused her mother’s asking her to quit school because of her belief in education.
“Tapi zaman sekarang tidak mungkin orang bisa hidup tanpa pendidikan. Pendidikan memberikan pengetahuan. Bahkan petani memerlukan pengetahuan tentang cara bercocok tanam yang tepat untuk mendapatkan hasil panen terbaiknya.” (Kuncoro 136)
“In this era, people can not live without education. Education provides knowledge. Even farmers need the knowledge about how to farm to get the best crop.”
“Mendapatkan pendidikan adalah hak setiap anak. Adalah kewajiban orang tua untuk memberikan pendidikan yang layak bagi setiap anak-anaknya tanpa kecuali.” (Kuncoro 126)
“To be educated is the right of every child. It is the duty of parent to provide education for all children without exception.” (My own translation)
Ma Yan’s mother’s decision to ask her daughter instead of her son to quit school reflects the hegemony of Chinese culture, which traditionally values sons more than daughters. Her decision shows that she is a victim of the hegemony, which appears as the “common sense” that guides every day, mundane understanding of the world. It is a view of the world that is “inherited from the past and uncritically absorbed” and which tends to reproduce a sort of social homeostasis, or “moral and political passivity” (Gramsci 1971).
“Bila sebuah keluarga menghadapi kemiskinan, maka anak-anak laki-lakilah yang akan mendapatkan kesempatan terbaik terlebih dahulu, sementara anak perempuan akan menjadi pilihan untuk menanggung penderitaan.” (Kuncoro 24)
Ma Yan’s mother’s decision may also be influenced by what she experienced as a child. Because she obeyed her mother, she did not go to school. Instead, she just the housework and worked on the farm to earn money for the family (Kuncoro 19). To her, a girl should be obedient and dedicate her life to her family as stated in the following quotation:
“Yang dimiliki perempuan itu hanyalah apa yang pada umumnya dimiliki perempuan desa, yakni kepatuhan dan kesetiaan untuk mengabdi. Bayang-bayang itu adalah aku.” (Kuncoro 22).
“What a girl has is what the village girls generally have; i.e. loyalty and obedience to serve. That shadow is me.” (My own translation)
Therefore, to Ma Yan’s mother, a girl does not need to go to school. Her opinion reflects the ideology which gives priority and opportunity to boys, which is the result of an ideology she “inherits from the past and uncritically absorbed” (William 333).
Ma Yan’s determination to study at school makes her mother’s change her belief about education. Because of her daughter she realizes that education is important and she thinks that it is not fair for her daughter to quit school. The following quotation represents her changed ideas about education:
“… pendidikan adalah alternatif terbaik untuk melepaskan diri dari takdir kemiskinan, bahwa pendidikan adalah sebuah pintu yang membuka jalan untuk mendapatkan kehidupan yang lebih baik daripada sekadar menjadi peladang dan buruh tanpa kepastian masa depan yang jelas (seperti yang selama ini kami jalani), maka kukuatkan hati untuk melepaskan anak-anakku menempuh jalur perjalanan itu demi meraih ilmu bagi masa depan.” (Kuncoro 128).
“…education is the best alternative to escape the fate of poverty, education is a door that opens the way to get a better life rather than just being a farmer and laborers without certainty, so I change my mind and let my children take the journey to get the education they need for their future.”
sekolah, karena itu akan membuat mereka bernasib seperti kita, tercengkeram kemiskinan tanpa batas waktu. Maka kita harus melakukan apa pun juga, supaya anak-anak kita menjadi orang-orang terdidik, karena itulah cara untuk melepaskan diri dari kemiskinan.” (Kuncoro 160)
“Ma Yan wants to stay in school. I’m not going to let our children drop out school because it will make them have the same fate as us, trapped in endless poverty. So we have to do anything to make our children educated because that is the way we can escape from poverty.” (My own translation)
It is clear that Ma Yan’ strong will to be educated is the only reason why her mother changes her mind. Besides, her decision to let Ma Yan continue her study and to do anything to pay for the tuition shows that the hegemonic ideology of woman culture, that woman comes second after man, does not work on her anymore. This fits William’s statement that, “a lived hegemony is always a process …it has continually to be renewed, recreated, defended, and modified. It is also continually resisted, limited, altered, challenged by pressures not at all its own” (112).
“Ma Yan ingin tetap sekolah. Aku tidak akan membiarkan anak-anak kita berhenti sekolah, karena itu akan membuat mereka bernasip seperti kita, tercengkeram kemiskinan tanpa batas waktu. Maka kita harus melakukan apa pun juga, supaya anak-anak kita menjadi orang-orang terdidik, karena itulah cara untuk melepaskan diri dari kemiskinan.” (Kuncoro 160)
“Ma Yan wants to stay in school. I’m not going to let our children out from the school because it will make them same with us, stay in poverty without the time limit. So we have to do anything to make our children educated because that is the way how we escape from the poverty.” (My own translation)
Ma Yan’s parents’ principle about education is reflected in the quotation below:
“Orang tuaku ingin menjadikan sekolah itu sebagai sebuah pintu untuk beranjak dari kehidupan lama pada kehidupan baru dengan berbagai harapan positif di dalamnya.” (Kuncoro 118)
“My parents want to make the school as a door to move to the new life with the positive expectation on it.” (My own translation)
only the conscious system of ideas and beliefs, but the whole lived social process as practically organized by specific and dominant meanings and values” (109). Poverty, which is their reality of life, the dominant value that education brings a good future and their daughter’s determination to go to school has changed their system of ideas and beliefs.
In contrast, Pambudi and his friends don’t think that education is important because their parents themselves don’t educated and force them to go to school. The poverty and the culture also influence them about it. Their parents still believe that working is more important than going to school. On the other hand, Yudi’s parents support their son’s desire to go to school. However, they immediately mention that they cannot afford it (Prasetyo 77).
Conclusion
The discussion reveals that most characters (Ma Yan, her parents and also Faisal and his three friends) in both novels believe that education is important. Even the protagonists of both novels consider that education will rescue them from poverty. That they have such a strong belief about education is interesting since they are elementary school students. As children, they must be influenced by adults, most probably their parents. Ma Yan’s parents believe that their children should be educated and they work very hard to realize it. Faisal’s parents are not described as ones who have similar principle as Ma Yan’s parents. However, Pepeng, Pambudi and Yudi’s parents are described as ones who think that their children had better help them earn for a living than going to school. Their belief, which represents Javanese peasant custom, proves to affect their sons. In short, family upbringing plays an important role. In addition, Faisal’s opinion of the importance of education is affected by his religious belief.
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