66 Nevertheless, Sekolah Rakyat is categorized into culture-specific term
because of the historical bound it has. A term which has specific bound to Indonesian history is therefore categorized in the category of organisations, ideas,
and customs. There is only one term which belongs to the category of organisations,
ideas, and customs in On Foreign Shores, namely Sekolah Rakyat. That term belongs to historical sub-category. The occurrence of culture-specific term which
belongs to the category of organisations, ideas, and customs is illustrated on the Table 4.4 below.
Table 4.4. The Organisations, Ideas, Customs Category
Culture-specific terms
Sub-categories Poems
Examples
Sekolah Rakyat Historical
Trem Berklenengan di Kota San Fransisco
Taufiq Ismail ...pada pelajaran ilmu
bumi di Sekolah Rakyat partikelir.
5. Gestures and Habits
The category of gestures and habits refers to those culture-specific terms related to particular gestures and habits “which occur in some cultures and not in
others” Newmark, 1988: 102. Later, Newmark also mentions some gestures and habits from all along the world, such as smiling a little when someone dies, doing
a slow hand-clap to express warm appreciation, spitting as a blessing, nodding to dissent or shake their head to assent, kissing their finger tips to greet or to praise,
giving a thumbs-up to signal affirmation, that belong to this category. Therefore,
67 this category embraces some movements and postures which occur in particular
culture only and not in other culture. In this research, terms that were considered to come under this category
are terms of gestures and habits practiced within any culture in Indonesia and barely practiced in other cultures. At last, two terms that belong to this category
were found in three poems, namely Surachman RM’s Hari Tua Mister Gilbert, Goenawan Mohamad’s Potret Taman untuk Allen Ginsberg, and Eka Budianta’s
Instrumentalia. One of those terms is found in two different poems, yet, still referring to the same posture in Indonesian culture.
a. “ongkang-ongkang dan goyang kaki” Surachman’s Hari Tua Mister Gilbert,
p. 66 Ongkang-ongkang is a kind of movement made by Indonesian people,
mostly Javanese, when they are sitting. People in Javanese tradition practice this gesture for relaxation. Functionally, this term is defined as a position of sit with
legs dangling in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia originally written as “duduk dengan kaki berjuntai,” p. 704, whilst Stevens and Schmidgall-Tellings’ A
Comprehensive Indonesian-English Dictionary defines the term ongkang-ongkang as an act to “sit with one’s legs dangling” p. 679. Based on the context, this term
literally refers to the movement of one’s feet as followed by another act involving one’s feet. This movement is mostly practiced in Indonesia, especially in Java,
and is not practiced in other cultures, especially in English speaking country. Because of its reference to a local movement in the SL culture, it becomes a
member of the category of gestures and habits.
