The ancient literati used apocalyptic pattern in their prophecies of social and political shocks.

On October 28, 1928, a group of young men daringly chose ‘bahasa Indonesia’—the new name that transgressed boundaries of ‘bahasa Melayu’—as the unifying language. At that moment, they showed the power of hybridity.

Democracy happens because the ignored and belittled rise up to affirm themselves. When Don Quixote was published in 1605, democracy did not exist in daily life. But Cervantes introduced his times to Sancho Panza, an illiterate farm laborer who wanted something impossible: to become governor.

La Vita è Bella cannot help but inspire. Maybe because we are living at the end of the 20th century with a number of questions that haunt us both before and after we enter the cinema: in a world with millions of Giosuès, is it true that life, also beauty and cruelty, are in the end a matter of how they are interpreted for us?

Power never exists in perfect form. It is rather the sign of something lacking, but it is effective because it produces main actors who can differ from one another, yet be of one desire: to overcome that sense of lack.

Hyperion, the tallest tree on earth, is not alone. Its arrogance is the fruit of fantasy.

In Sandhyakala Ning Majapahit, Damar Wulan is troubled as he confronts philosophical questions about the meaning of life, why he must die, and whether so-called good and bad exist.

In a crime of passion, people can act brutally in a flash: an explosion of uncontrolled emotion sparked by jealousy.

The word “populist” began with no negative associations. It was easy to accept because it implied equality between citizens. But then it changed.

Salman Rushdie wants to expose a black allegory about faith that oppresses, teachings that spread unquestioning acceptance, and leaders who are clever at persuading the anxious.

A sacrifice is a negotiation—and inspiration.

Zhuangzi did not imagine a world structured like a tree. His picture of the world more resembled what in biology is called a rhizome, which in Deleuze’s philosophy is a concept of a network “without beginning or end, always in the middle, between things.”

Simple identity plagues us, especially when we come across the category, ‘foreign descent’.

Serat Centhini tells a story of a woman from a forest, Retna Ginubah.

April 21: maybe I am missing Yosie. Or I want to hear a Kartini who makes language not merely statement, but also poetry.

Freedom is always fragile. People always need the will to fight for it, whether in Ancient Greece or in Mariupol in the 21st century.

James Joice, an Irish writer, wrote Ulysses in 1922. His 730 pages novel has changed world literature.

To build linguistic demarcations in Indonesia is to build walls with illusions. At the very least, such demarcation is fragile.

These days, statistics, as part of science, direct our assessment of threat, failure, opportunity, accuracy and imprecision. 

Photographic journalism forbids the fictive, but like perception, many things come together. The work of journalism does not stand alone. It is not only the work of the photographers, but also their technology, and those who view it. 

Prophecies, primbon: signs of anxiety. Traumatic changes to life in Java at the end of the 19th century, for instance, encouraged the circulation of the 'Jayabaya prophecy', Jangka Jayabaya.

In the conflict and competition between ‘left’ and ‘right’, what came to the fore was not embittered ideologs or tough guerillas, but the skills of political campaign managers, the competence of advertising bureaus, the canny display of clothing styles, handsome faces and slim bodies.

There was no coup d’état on September 30. Or on October 1, 1965. What happened was more confusing than that—and still, there is no fitting word to name it. But after that day, the Indonesian Communist Party collapsed.

Ambiguity—others might call it diversity—is being gradually suppressed. Civilization is changing. In capitalist societies, in a life system where science, high technology and administration shape people’s lives, there is no place for ambiguity.

Tat Twam Asi. Schrödinger viewed the universe as one. Randomness and plurality are illusions.

As seen from today, Isaac Newton’s physics are indeed simple. His classic physics views reality like a huge machine that moves forward with time, in changing configurations following fixed laws, like Newton’s three laws of movement.

The pandemic has made me—and not only me—anxious about space and sensitive to distance. Maybe this is what the pandemic is shaping, slowly but surely: with these months-long rules about ‘keeping distance’, we are getting used to negotiating with space.

George Washington was respected and praised not only because of his role in the war of independence, but also because he seemed to be someone who did not want political power for himself.

The faces on the billboards are really just phantoms of the desire for recognition and the ambition for power – a soft version of the face of the king about to seize lands.

Under a regime that declares a constant state of war, citizens are placed within a prison-like Jeremy Bentham’s ideal construction, the panopticon: on its high tower are the eyes of Argus Panoptes.

AI, artificial intelligence, is both exciting and worrying—and that is our state right now. It is often observed that the more super-intelligent these machines are, the less autonomy we have. We can no longer call ourselves decision-making subjects. It could spell the end of individuality. 

Given this atmosphere, it is understandable why Toeti Heraty entered the field of philosophy and paid particular attention to the person as subject and their world. Her thesis was titled Aku dalam Budaya (I in Culture).

In Murakami’s story, the first question that arises is: are names personal possessions? Where do we get them from?

In Bergman’s film, The Seventh Seal, Block does not seem worried that it will all be pointless. He is returning from war, he has travelled through plague territory. He has seen how easily lives are lost. The thin knight with the tense expression is anxious not because of Death, but because God is silent. He has found no basis to his faith. Faith is a torment.

Maxime Rodinson is an atheist. But he is not one to shut himself off with arrogance as do the ‘new atheists’. He sees that “…Muhammad did really experience sensory phenomena translated into words and phrases and that he interpreted them as messages from the Supreme Being.”

The dalang creates an aesthetic construct with layers of components. Voice, sound, diction, intonation and rhythm interconnect when he describes a scene, creates dialogue (with different personalities), introduces humor, makes Bhima move, and moves two wayang in combat.

Like power, noble values are usually associated with heroes – which is one reason people build monuments. These values—nobility of spirit, courage and so on—have no fixed place. The fixed is not in anyone’s heart.

The gods make unnecessary laws because they do not know mortality. A king on earth makes laws, even if they are not good because he is human—he must protect life that is contingent. 

Titles, which are considered to be symbols of recognition, are actually not completely dialogic in nature. Titles are determined after authorities exist to assess a person’s achievement. There have to be judges whose word is not doubted: universities, palaces, or customary leaders. 

Until at least the early 17th century in the Turkish Ottoman empire, the successor was not determined by birth rank. The principle of succession was brutal: the strongest won. It was brutal competition.