Old and New Cultures of Indonesia

With over 350 cultural ethnic groups in the country, the cultural diversity of Indonesia is large and also wide-spread. Based on an article in Indonesia's Official Tourism Website, there are still many areas that practice their ethnic rituals, customs, produce exotic arts and crafts and wear traditional clothes. There are also few still live indigenously with uniquely Indonesian practices, live in places where traditional beliefs and rituals, that their traditional and culture still dominate daily life. Areas where tradition and culture still flourish instead of the acculturation and adaptation to a more technological lifestyle would be The Wamena Highlands, Madobak Ugai Matotonan Village and the Jangga Village.



The media are a large impact on Indonesians in general. With my previous blog post showing how much of a social networking giant Indonesia is turning out to be, it's obvious to see how influenced most of their society is and how much they are pulled into sources such as Facebook, Twitter and other micro-blogging habits.

Another media impact would be the role of television. Found in a study that looked at how television and radio affected the smaller indigenous culture of Indonesia, it found that there is a larger amount of television and radio feeds which cause smaller cultured groups to practice more of a technological lifestyle, whether it be simply focusing more on the media feed or just disentangling themselves from their cultural practices. Their habits are changing slowly since television and radio broadcasts are still limited to more of the secluded sections, but there is a change.

As far assimilation, marginalization and integration goes for these smaller cultures, it's minimal. It appears they still adhere to their original traditions but maintaining a grasp on the media to acquire themselves with important news from the radio. Unlike the more technology advanced parts of Indonesia where microblogging and "tweeting" is prominent, these cultures stick to what they know, and what they know is tradition.