Muninggar Sri Saraswati – Traditional West Javanese jaipongan and bajidoran dancers may be some of the first artists to feel the effects of the stricter antipornography law pushed through the Indonesian legislature last year.
The Islam-based Prosperous Justice Party, or PKS, has asked dancers to cover up and minimize gyrating movements when they dance if they wish to perform.
An official in West Java Province said on Friday that he had been told by Ahmad Heryawan, the PKS governor of West Java, that dancers must tone down the "hip shaking" that plays a significant role in Sundanese dancing.
"Female [dancers] are expected to minimize hip shaking to prevent misinterpretation," said Herdiwan, head of the West Java Province Tourism and Culture A gency, citing the governor.
The governor suggested that the dancers cover their chests with "something like a traditional kebaya top," instead of the tube tops often sported by dancers.
"It's a bit revealing. In the 1970s, jaipongan and bajidoran dancers wore kebaya tops," he said, referring to the traditional tops for Muslim women. Herdiwan added that the call was a only a request.
But Tifatul Sembiring, national PKS chairman, suggested that the governor's comments reflected the possibility that the traditional dances might violate the controversial antipornography law passed in October.
He said that "[the suggestion] was made to anticipate the antipornography law. [The governor] is only trying to keep the culture from disappearing by making it less erotic."
The law, which broadly defines pornography, is supposed to exempt cultural performances. The PKS faction in the House of Representatives was instrumental in initiating and passing the bill.
Tifatul insinuated that jaipongan was historically an erotic dance linked to "negative places," rather than a cultural art, and that the PKS effort to reign it in did not amount to an attempt to introduce Shariah law in West Java.
Artists condemned the comments, saying jaipongan was to be respected as a part of West Java's Sundanese culture. Mas Nanu Muda, a lecturer at the Bandung Dance Institute, criticized the governor's call, saying that it offended Sundanese artists.
"He suggested that artists are immoral. The dances are not just about 'hip shaking' – dancers have to learn the moves," he said. Nanu said the governor should focus on more important issues like eliminating corruption.
The social dances, which are performed by women, started in the 1970s as a contemporary take on the Ketuk Tilu dance.
The PKS statements mark the second time this week the party's take on morality has been in the spotlight, after a PKS councilor in Jambi Province was seen in a legal massage parlor. A PKS spokesman said the parlor was not providing sexual services, but that married PKS men should only be massaged by blind male masseuses.