Herman Neubronner Van Der Tuuk - Linguistics and Linguistic Politics in The East Indies

Linguistics and Linguistic Politics in The East Indies

Linguistic activities in the Dutch East Indies were motivated by missionary activities until well into the nineteenth century. Linguistic studies were taken up with a view to translating the Bible into Indonesian languages, and Malay and Javanese served as starting points. By the middle of the nineteenth century, religious linguists were ready to turn to research into other indigenous languages and to translate the Bible into them.

One of the first languages (or rather, language groups) chosen for this purpose was Batak. The choice was motivated by political motives as well as religious ones. Roman Catholic missionaries, who had been banned from carrying out their activities, were re-admitted to the colony from 1807, and throughout the nineteenth century were in tough competition with their Protestant opposite numbers. Another motive was the desire to keep Islam in check. The Malay population of East-Sumatra and of the coastal regions had become predominantly Muslim by this time, but the ethnic groups in the interior had not been converted, and were, as contemporary terminology had it, still “pagans”. It was assumed they would be more receptive to conversion than those already Islamised. Among these interior tribes were the Batak. Protestant mission from the Netherlands was in the hands of Nederlands Bijbel Genootschap (“Society for the Translation of the Bible”, NBG).