Abstract

Laksmi Pamuntjak’s first novel, Amba (2012) is one of several contemporary Indonesian novels by the post-1965 generation that breaks the silence on the violent suppression of the Indonesian left in the mid-1960s. Like other recent creative responses and initiatives by Indonesian artists and civil society, Amba represents the “postmemory” of the 1965-66 events. This paper examines the modes of internal exile triggered by 1965 as portrayed in three characters in Amba and how exile disrupts and delays identity formation across different generations of Indonesians—hence, exiled identities. The history of Moluccan exile post-1950 is also crucial to the novel’s representation of people whose identities were displaced, ruptured, or in limbo as a result of political violence. The depiction of internal exile in Amba is examined based on work done by scholars on Indonesian exile narratives (Hill, Hearman) and concepts of transgenerational trauma (Schwab) and postmemory (Hirsch). This paper then discusses the various acts of “re-membering” to recover a coherent sense of self and of the nation depicted in Amba, such as through literal and figurative journeys, re-establishing kinship ties, narrating personal memories of the traumatic past, and the role of art in revealing suppressed memories of the 1965 event.

Keywords

contemporary Indonesian fiction, exile in fiction, Indonesia 1965-66, Laksmi Pamuntjak, literature and memory, literature and postmemory

Please login first to access subscription form of article

Read Full text in PDF

Browse By

Kritika Kultura
Department of English
School of Humanities
Ateneo de Manila University

The Philippine Commission on Higher Education (CHED) declares Kritika Kultura as a CHED-recognized journal under the Journal Challenge Category of its Journal Incentive Program.

International Board of Editors

Jan Baetens
Professor
Faculty of Arts
Katholieke Universiteit te Leuven (Belgium)

Joel David
Professor of Cultural Studies
Inha University (South Korea)

Michael Denning
Professor of American Studies and English
Department of English
Yale University (US)

Faruk
Faculty of Cultural Sciences
Universitas Gadjah Mada (Indonesia)

Regenia Gagnier
Professor of English
University of Exeter (UK)

Leela Gandhi
John Hawkes Professor of the Humanities and English
Brown University (US)

Inderpal Grewal
Professor of Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies
Professor of South Asian Studies, Ethnicity, Race and Migration Studies
Yale University (US)

Peter Horn
Professor Emeritus and Honorary Lifetime Fellow
University of Cape Town (South Africa)
Honorary Professor and Research Associate in German Studies
University of the Witwatersrand (South Africa)

Anette Horn
Professor of German Studies
University of the Witwatersrand (South Africa)

David Lloyd
Distinguished Professor of English
University of California, Riverside (US)

Bienvenido Lumbera
National Artist for Literature
Professor Emeritus
University of the Philippines

Rajeev S. Patke
Director of the Division of Humanities
Professor of Humanities
Yale NUS College (Singapore)

Vicente L. Rafael
Giovanni and Amne Costigan Endowed Professor of History
University of Washington (US)

Vaidehi Ramanathan
Department of Linguistics
University of California, Davis (US)

Temario Rivera
Professorial Lecturer
Department of Political Science
University of the Philippines

E. San Juan, Jr.
Philippines Studies Center (US)

Neferti X.M. Tadiar
Professor of Women’s, Gender, & Sexuality Studies
Barnard College (US)
Director of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race
Columbia University (US)

Antony Tatlow
Honorary Professor of Drama
Trinity College Dublin (Ireland)