Tour guides’ multilingualism in the city of Bandung, Indonesia: What does the policy say?

Abstract

Language proficiency and multilingualism play an important role in the tourism industry in order for people to market their product of tourism and for international tourists to communicate during their exploration within a certain destination. Moreover, policies regarding tour guides’ self-development, including one related to multilingualism, are also inevitably important so that tour guides have clear rules and regulation as well as a legal basis for their self-development. The aim of this study is to analyze the policy and condition of multilingualism among tour guides in the city of Bandung, Indonesia. This qualitative study collected the data through documents of policies in relation to tour guides and relevant references from previous studies. The collected data were then analyzed using descriptive and content analyses. It has been found that Bandung, the capital city of West Java province, Indonesia, does not have any legal document concerning tour guides, let alone their self-development, including language training. In the meantime, other provinces, such as Bali, Central Java, and East Java, had a policy on that. What West Java province has had is a policy regarding the standardized services and principles of tourism in West Java preserving the noble values of Sundanese culture. Therefore, it is recommended that the local government of Bandung and West Java start discussing the making of policy concerning tour guides, including their language development, either two languages (bilingual) or more than two languages (multilingual).