Wursita Day 1. CC BY-SA 4.0. By Imam Ahmad. Used with permission.
Participants from Yogyakarta and surrounding cities gathered in Sleman from May 24–25, 2025, to explore effective methods and digital tools to promote the Javanese language. Javanese is the largest language in the Austronesian family by number of native speakers, and yet it remains one of the largest languages in the world without official recognition. As a minoritized language, Javanese faces challenges such as intergenerational language loss, underrepresentation in media, and persistent social stigma.
The event, “Wursita,” was organized through a collaboration between Rising Voices and the Wikimedian Community of Yogyakarta (this author, Fandy Aprianto Rohman, and Sahmu Hidayat), in partnership with the UNESCO Regional Office in Jakarta, Wikimedia Indonesia, and Babad.id. The name “Wursita” was chosen both for its meaning, a speech or narrative, and its nostalgic connection, as it is also a common title for elementary language textbooks, reminding us of relearning our native language.
Over the course of two days, participants deepened their understanding of how digital activism can support Javanese language revitalization and advocacy. They reflected on their experiences using the Javanese language, identified the changes they aimed to influence, explored suitable approaches, and reviewed relevant examples. Based on selected tactics from the toolkit, they developed plans aligned with their skills and concerns. On the second day, they began learning practical steps for creating and maintaining Javanese social media accounts, while also receiving guidance on writing in the Javanese language. At the end of the workshop, participants were introduced to a small infographic competition.
Day 1: Connecting people's voices
On the first day of the workshop, participants were initially invited to reflect on how they experience the Javanese language. Afterward, they took turns sharing their experiences in small groups. A representative from each group then shared highlights of their discussion with the class, including some funny and insightful stories, such as: “I feel proud speaking Javanese to get a better deal with local merchants,” or “I feel reluctant to speak Javanese to older people because they may expect me to speak perfect Krama (high-register, aka the formal and ‘polite’ form of Javanese).”
In the next session, participants were encouraged to write down their hopes for the future of the Javanese language using AnswerGarden. The top answer was a single word: lestari, which translates to “everlasting” or “sustainable.” Other small yet noteworthy responses included: “do not overcorrect,” “becoming the language of instruction in schools,” and “no discrimination against ‘low-register’ [less formal] forms or different dialects.” Just before the lunch break, participants were asked to identify the challenges they face, categorized into eight areas ranging from linguistic to economic issues.
Wursita Day 1. CC BY-SA 4.0. By Imam Ahmad. Used with permission.
Later on the first day, we held an ice-breaking quiz where participants had to guess four inspiring Javanese proverbs using only visual clues. This activity successfully re-energized the room while still emphasizing the cultural importance of Javanese idioms. The most difficult idiom to guess — also one that is rarely used — was “Luwih becik pager mangkok, tinimbang pager témbok,” which one participant correctly identified and explained as, “True security is gained through looking out for one another instead of dividing people.”
The workshop then continued with a session on “Digital Movements and Language Preservation Tactics,” based on UNESCO's Digital Initiatives for Indigenous Languages, using Javanese-oriented examples. Afterward, participants began working on their personalized roadmaps, which would be presented the following day.
Here is a video highlighting day one of the event:
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Day 2: Creative ideas for the future
The second day of the workshop began with individual roadmap presentations in front of the class. Participants showcased a range of creative ideas, including animations, social media campaigns, and educational materials. Two notable roadmaps stood out for their unique concepts and creative design. The first was presented by Sita, who proposed a social media platform aimed at educating people about Javanese traditional calendrical calculations and astrology. The second was by Ifah, who introduced the idea of educational board games to help children become familiar with Javanese puppetry figures.
This was followed by a presentation on practical matters titled “Social Media Content Creation and Management with a Focus on Regional Languages” that broke down the process of social media content creation and management — covering how to identify audiences, the stages of content development, designing content pillars, classifying information design, exploring themes, using open resources, and documenting and evaluating social media performance.
The presentation continued with a segment discussing social media research conducted by Wikimedia Indonesia, which provided insights into how certain types of content tend to receive higher engagement than others. The third segment of the session focused on the dos and don'ts of visual communication, offering deeper guidance on the graphic design aspects of content creation. The session concluded with an explanation of the infographic poster competition that participants would take part in.
The second half of the second day began with an ice-breaker quiz in which participants raced to transliterate Latin text into Javanese script as quickly as possible. This activity served as a warm-up for a comprehensive presentation titled “Javanese Language and Writing System Guidelines” by Sahmu Hidayat. The presentation summarized key aspects of speaking and writing in the Javanese language, covering topics such as social registers, geographical dialects, writing systems and orthography, common misspellings, and helpful linguistic resources to support content creation. Although the session was lengthy, participants remained highly engaged and attentive, as the topic resonated strongly with the core of Javanese cultural identity. The session also sparked various interesting discussions, ranging from the history of language politics in Indonesia to the gradual shift of the Javanese cultural center from Surakarta to Yogyakarta.
Wursita Day 2. CC BY-SA 4.0. By Imam Ahmad. Used with permission.
Some of Wursita’s participants expressed how useful they found the workshop and appreciated its format, which effectively connected the Javanese language with the digital world. Several even inquired about the possibility of a second Wursita workshop. Sita, a participant from the neighboring city of Surakarta, shared her interest in replicating a similar workshop in her own community.
Here is a video highlighting day two of the event:
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This post is from Rising Voices, a Global Voices project that helps spread citizen media to places that don't normally have access to it. All Posts
