Preserving Culture through Generations

Hey good readers!

How was your day?

After sharing ideas through my previous posts, now I wanna write another insightful post which all of you may interested in, so make sure you read this post and understand it so you can catch the meaning.

My post here will be talk about culture preservation.

Talking about culture means we are talking about the noble heritage of our predecessors. A culture that grows out of good manners will become something that characterizes the area. However, if the application of the value in each culture itself was wrong, then it might affect the lives of the people which leads to the bad moral value. Nowadays, we already know that culture is a long-term development of the way of human life and mostly owned by a group of people. Culture is something that inherited from the previous generation to the upcoming generation which deals with local wisdom. Local wisdom is formed as a cultural superiority of the local community as well as from the geographical situation. Local wisdom is a product of past culture, which should be a lifeline forever. We may notice that Indonesia is a country that well known as the rich culture within it. Every island has different and unique culture and local wisdom that developed in a long time. This culture is formed from various elements including religious and political systems, customs, language, clothing, buildings, and artwork. Language, as well as culture, is an integral part of the human being, so many people tend to think of it as being genetically inherited. It can be proven that language is the element of culture and it happened when the different person which came from different area, they might have different kinds of language and also communication way to interact with others.

Bali beautiful island that Indonesia’s has which is in the spotlight of an outer country. Bali Island is known from its natural beauty, the hospitality of the people and the uniqueness of its art and culture. The majority of Balinese are adherents of Hinduism. Balinese uniqueness can also be seen from the community in conducting kinship with other people in their own area and as well as outsiders. Culture that grows on the Bali Island and become a local wisdom is formed from elements of diversity, customs, art and language. If we look at the element of religion, Bali, with its predominantly Hindu inheritance culture of a religious ritual, has many rituals of Hindu religion that characterize Balinese life. Many life philosophies were gained from the implementation of rituals in Bali. In Hinduism it is taught about Tri Hita Karana in which man has relationship with plants, with his fellowman and certainly with God. This lesson makes Balinese people can live in a balance with nature, known for always "menyame braya" and act according to the teachings of God. From the element of custom, Bali is known for its social system. There’s no other places than Bali in Indonesia, that has Banjar, Subak, Sekeha, and menyame Braya or Gotong Royong. Then Bali recognizes the existence of a caste system. The next element is art. Many kinds of art produced by Balinese artists, such as dance, gamelan, wayang, carving, makekawin and many more has become the symbol and local wisdom of Bali. Lastly, in the perspective of language element. Just like other island that has its own regional language, Bali also has its own regional language. However, there are several diversity of the Balinese language from other areas, namely the language of Bali has differences of language level which is used in different situations and depends on the person whom the person we talk to, and each region has a different language dialect.

We have known the culture that we have. So what should we do with that culture? Should we just watch and admire the art that we have? Or should we keep, learn and preserve it so it can be inherited and remained as local wisdom? Or even should we replace it with a new culture and follow the changing times? An intellectual and virtuous will learn it and not just admire the culture. It would be very easy if we just watch the culture that exists in our environment but it will be difficult to learn it. On the other hand, the difficult thing it is always possible to do so.

One more question was addressed, who is the person that have the obligation to preserve our culture? Yes, it is definitely all of us, no matter what kind of profession is. Actually, the upcoming generation have more roles to continue and preserve that culture because they have more opportunities to learn. The previous generation then should guide them how is the way that they can do to preserve the culture. If we ask other countries to adopt our culture, they will probably want to, but will we give them the customs that have been built and the art that has been born from the Balinese artists? The answer is no. If the same incident happens again, when several years ago other countries recognize the culture that was born in our country as their culture, because of our ignorance and lack of awareness of what we have. If this couldn’t be realized, then don’t be surprised later, if we lose the local wisdom and make ourselves have no identity anymore.

We do exist in the era of Globalization, where technology plays an important role in everything, we also can’t shut out from the outside world, but the thing we need to make ourselves competitive is to show ourselves with the culture that we have. As a generation in entrusted a great heritage of local culture and wisdom, we have to remember about the obligation to preserve it. We must not lose the thing that has become our own characteristic. Don’t give them a chance to reclaim our rights to their rights again. We may developed, but in terms of where we come from and how we are created, it has to be remembered and we should not be afraid to look different because we inherit an extraordinary culture.

Last but not least, there is someone who said “when you become a red in all black, you know you are different but you know you are wonderful too because you can give a color into yourself.”