Ki Hadjar Dewantara and the Taman Siswa Schools; Notes on an Extra-Colonial Theory of Education

Abstract

IF ONE EXAMINES THE STRAINS of education under colonial rule it is possible to discern four main elements; these have been usefully distinguished for us by John Furnivall, in his classic study Colonial Policy and Practice.2 There were, in Furnivall's terminology, European schools, which catered for the expatriate children of the colonial rulers, but which in some cases admitted a few of the children of the local elites; these schools were in fact outliers of the metropolitan system which was their educational referent. Then there were Western schools, recruiting the children of the colonial subjects, but answering the-service needs of the colonial enterprise, and using a European language as the medium of instruction. Also as part of the colonial enterprise, but in a more subordinate position, there were Vernacular schools, created by the colonial regime or its agents. The Vernacular were also primarily Western in coriception and curriculum, but they used local languages as the mediums of instruction. Finally there were Native schools, which were generally outside the orbit of colonial interests; in most cases these were religious institutions which had existed before the colonial period. Depending on the nature of the particular colonial situation the significance of each of these elements varied. In some cases, where there was little or no European settlement, there were no European schools. The relative importance of each of the two colonially inspired components, Western and Vernacular, and the strength of the articulating connections between them, differed from colony to colony. In some cases any pre-existing native school. system atrophied or was eclipsed with the advent of colonially stimulated social change. But in other cases the Native schools remained vigorous, and responded to change with determined resistance, or valiant attempts at imitation, or judgment, discrimination, and carefully evolved schemes for adaptation. This paper is concerned with an examination of the third type of response from the Native schools: adaptation. It is unfortunate for the historian of educa