Remembering the 1998 Indonesian Sorcerers Massacre: Memory of Tragedy and Trauma in Intan Andaru’s Perempuan Bersampur Merah (Woman in Red Scarf)

Abstract

After the collapse of the New Order government, in the 1998-1999, hundreds of people who were considered to be sorcerers were killed, especially in Banyuwangi. In the obscurity, Intan Andaru has narrated these events into her work. Her novel, Perempuan Bersampur Merah (Woman in Red Scarf), tells massacre story form the voiceless accused sorcerer’s point of view. This article aims to discuss the representational character of the 1998 Indonesian sorcerer massacre as depicted in the work of fiction. This research uses a psycho-historical approach. The data collection technique was done by using a note-taking technique. The analysis technique is carried out by the stages of presenting data, reducing data, and drawing conclusions. The results showed that there was no authentic evidence to support the accusation that the person who was killed was actually a sorcerer. As a result, cultural trauma is an important part of the psychological suffering experienced by the victim’s family. This trauma cannot be erased because the stigmata as a descendant of a sorcerer will always be attached to the victim’s family. This novel revives the social and cultural memorial structure of the 1998 Indonesian massacre in the form of individual aesthetic mediation to activate historical memory.