Ecological Wisdom Values in Gedong Wareng Folklore in Pacitan

Abstract

Environmental folklore is one of the nearly extinct oral literatures. The dominant factor is the environmental crisis that makes people not preserve folklore as a heritage that should be preserved. Technological advances make oral literature, especially environmental folklore, left behind and neglected. This research aimed to interpret the ecocritical theory of literature by expressing forms of ecological wisdom in Gedong Wareng folklore in Pacitan Regency. Ecocriticism is applied to examine folklore through data classification based on the moral principles of ecological wisdom. This research is a descriptivequalitative research with an ethnographic approach by using interview transcripts regarding Gedong Wareng folklore with the participants in Pacitan regency as data sources. The data were collected using interviews, observation, documentation, field notes, and transcription. There are three aspects in the data analysis technique, namely description, analysis, and interpretation. The research found nine data from five elements of ecological wisdom values in the Gedong Banteng Wareng folklore in Pacitan Regency. People still believe in the story and hold its ecological wisdom values, and thus, until now, they, hand in hand, keep preserving the Gedong Wareng area.