IDENTITY SHIFT ON TRADITIONAL CLOTHES FOR WOMEN IN TUBAN, EAST JAVA, INDONESIA

Abstract

Tuban, East Java, Indonesia has a long history. Since centuries ago, Tuban has playing a role as one of ancient trading ports between western and eastern world. It has been explained Sedyawati, et al (1992) that foreign people who came to Tuban were traders came from North India, South India, Sailan, Burma, Cambodia, and Campa. As an international port, Tuban has received many foreign cultures in addition to its local culture, such as culture that was brought by Tionghoa and Gujarat people. Therefore, Tuban’s development that involves international relationship also impacted to the manifestation of tradition and culture that appears in Tuban until now. One of the effects is on traditional cloth products. As has been expained Achjadi, et al (2010) that the cloth’s making and coloring processes performed by Tuban community has been running since a long time ago, around 1319 AD. In addition to be used as basic material for clothes, these cloths are also used to meet special needs such as: to show social status, group’s identity, ritual, and is also a part of their life philosophy. But nowadays, visualization and the use of Tuban’s cloth has shifted where it no longer follows traditional standard/rules, it instead is a free and dynamic creation upon economic motivation. This condition proves that possibilities of which tradition experiences transformation as the effect of cultural reception and assimilation towards foreign tradition/foreign culture emerge. Through qualitative methodology with cultural transformation and oral tradition approaches, this research focuses on the attempt on looking at the shifting process occurs to visual identity and comparison in terms of the use of cloth as traditional clothes of Tuban community back then and now.