Gagasan dan Aktiviti Wartawan Wanita Minangkabau Pada Masa Kolonial Belanda (Minangkabau Women Journalists During The Dutch Colonial Period In Indonesia)

Abstract

The Minangkabau people of West and Central Sumatera have traditionally followed a matrilineal social system, a fact that has allowed women to play a major role in many socio-political activities central to Indonesian national life. Since the early twentieth century, for example, Minangkabau women have time and again proven their ability as journalists, writers, teachers and politicians. As journalists, Minangkabau women have been very influential in the Indonesian and Sumatran press. Indeed, the first female newspapers to have been published in the Malay world, Soenting Melajoe (1912) and Soeara Perempoean (1914) were edited by Minangkabau women. These publications, amongst many others, played a formative role in a burgeoning Indonesian nationalist movement and actively promoted ideas about female emancipation. This article explores the printed press of early-twentieth century Indonesia and Sumatra as a close lens into the social and political world of Minangkabau women.