The Tradition of Giving Name in Madurese

Assalamu'alaikum Wr. Wb.

Hello friends ... How’s your day? InsyaAllah I’m sure, you’re all good, yeah ... Amen. Alhamdulillah, the second written  on my blog has been completed finally, and one thing that make me happy is there are those who read this blog again ...🙌 🙌(Horeee!!). As usual, this blog was created to fulfill the task of post-intermediate reading subject. In the previous blog, I told you about history and meaning of my name. Well, on this blog I will review about the process and tradition of naming someone in each region. Alright because I am a Madurese, so I will explain the naming tradition in Madura itself.

The Madurese are ethnic groups originally from the island of Madura now found in many parts of Indonesia, where they are the third largest ethnic group by population. According to Wikipedia, BPS held a population census in 2010. In the SP, the total population of Madurese was recorded at 7,179,356 million. Wow, What a fantastic number !!! We can imagine that millions of people must have names that are different from each other even though it doesn't close the possibility if there is a name that happens to be the same. Well, so How is the naming tradition in Madura?

The issue of the naming people for most Madurese is very crucial, because the name is prayer. They are very careful in this regard because the Madurese have the motto of their ancestors " asmah nika menangkah duweh ben tengka lakoh " which means this name is synonymous with prayer and shows his behavior. Therefore, Madurese are very selective in giving names to their children by paying attention to good pronunciation and the most important is the meaning of the name. Basically, Giving baby names is given to their parents. But it has become a tradition before choosing names for their children, most Madurese will spend (in terms of Javanese "sowan") to kyai or teacher to ask for names to give to their children. Because they believe, the kyai who is in fact close to the Creator “Allah” knows more about the names of good people in pronunciation and their meaning.

When asking the name to Kyai, commonly Kyai will ask about the time, day, place, etc. That related to the birth of the baby. This is done to provide a name that is appropriate for the baby. In general, the names of the people chosen by the kyai has taken from the language of Al-Qur’an or Arabic which has a good meaning. It is impossible, they will give the name "Naru Jahannam, or Khati'ah Najisah" to the child even though the pronunciation was in Al-Qur’an, because those name have a bad meaning that are Jahannam Hell and who is sinful, unclean and dirty.

Commonly, if they have sons, Madurese will put the name "Muhammad or Ahmad" before their original names like Muhammad Ali Ferdiyansyah and Ahmad Musfiq Amrullah. It was done to attribute to Prophet Muhammad SAW. with the hope that someday the child will have the good character like the Prophet Muhammad. However if the child is a girl, usually before the original name will be added with the name "Siti" which comes from the word "Sayyidah" ​​which means "mistress" like Siti Khumairah, Siti Jamilah, Siti Khodijah, etc.

The taking of names from the language of Al-Qur’an or Arabic is certainly not separated from the diversity of the Madurese who are predominantly Muslim. Even the Islamic Boarding School has a pivotal role in Madurese life. Even so, there is also the possibility that there are also names that do not come from Arabic such as Selvi, Dimas, Anton, etc. Such names are called by the name Ajam nation. In Arabic, Ajam (عجم) has the main meaning: "separate from Arabic". It literally means "illiterate," "silent," or "mute", and refers to non-Arabs in general. In the first sense it has a neutral meaning which means "foreign" or "outsider".

Another unique of naming tradition in Madura is how to call the nickname of people, especially those who speak Arabic. This is different from calling the names of people in other regions. In Madura, in calling a name consisting of two words such as Muhammad Ali, there will be a letter sounding so that only the final syllable that will remain, the syllable "Muh-ham" will experience disappointment, until only the syllable "mad" However, the pronunciation of the word "mad" in its realization when pronounced will change to / t //, therefore Muhammad Ali is called Mat Ali.

This is influenced by the structure of the Madurese language (the level of morphology) that is often spoken in everyday life, namely the form of reduplication that occurs in its words. For example the word orèng-orèng and lake'-lake ', then in the first word, the syllable "o" and "la" will experience disappointment, then only remain " rèng " and "ke’", so that " orèng-orèng " will be " rèng-orèng " and " lake'-lake’" to " ke'-lake’ ".

That’s all the tradition of the Madurese people in giving their children names both their full names and their nick names. I do apologize if there are words that are a little bit  misunderstanding. Hopefully it will be useful for us and Don't forget to like and comment gengs ... 😎 😎 see ya on next blog!!!

Wassalamu'alaikum Wr. Wb.