Indonesian Mockery of the Dutch during the Indonesian Struggle to Maintain Independence (1945-1948)

Abstract

Research on the struggle for Indonesian independence (1945-1949) and the harsh response of the Dutch to their former colony is abundant, with most studies focusing on the nature and forms of violence. One neglected area of research is how Indonesian nationalists represented the conflict in the form of mockery. This study intends to fill this gap by examining mocking textual representations of the Dutch, created and disseminated by Indonesians through print media. By 1945, the Indonesians had declared their independence and considered themselves fully capable of taking care of their new country. When the Dutch tried to take back rule in Indonesia, they were sarcastically accused of trying to recolonise Indonesia by cruel means. By contrasting the good ‘us’ with the bad ‘them’, mocking representations became a way for Indonesians to ridicule the Dutch. In these representations, the Dutch were portrayed as the people of a tiny country – compared to a large Indonesia – who were colonial-minded in an equal post-war world. Indonesians moreover emphasised the weak authority of the Dutch in Java and depicted them as perpetrators who falsely arrested innocent Indonesians, as producers of false propaganda, and as people who often boasted to be clever but actually lacked knowledge and were easily deceived by Indonesian fighters. This paper elucidates issues pertaining a type of representations that should be understood as an additional, yet often forgotten form of resistance against occupying foreign forces in the post-World War ii era.