PERSONAL NAMES AS AN INTER-ETHNIC MODEL OF ACCULTURATION IN INDONESIA

Research on the subject of personal names is an interesting source for discovering the development of the thoughts, ideas, traditions, and life patterns of a person in an underlying collective. The specific goal of this research is to describe the development of the form of personal names in the Semarang community and to discover the inter-ethnic model of acculturation in a social and cultural context based on the dynamics of the life of the local community. This study uses a qualitative research method with reference to the theories of Miles and Huberman (1992) and Sutopo (2008). The location of the research was the city of Semarang in Central Java, Indonesia. The type of research is a field study which uses a single strategy, focussing on the personal names found in the city of Semarang in Central Java. The results of the research indicate the existence of name forms that are a product of inter-ethnic acculturation. This process of acculturation occurs both convergently and divergently. The process of convergence occurs due to the influence of several different cultures on a name, resulting in a new name that is a typically Indonesian name. The process of divergence occurs when there is a process of dispersion of the use of a Javanese (Indonesian) name in a foreign name (of a foreign ethnic group) in a form which is either complete or partial. This study proves two things, namely (1) that a process of inter-ethnic acculturation has taken place between Javanese names and foreign names, and (2) that a process of “mutual acceptance” has occurred between the culture of the migrant community and the local culture within the context of personal names, a process which is continuing to develop diachronically.