GOODBYE INDONESIA A Critical Discourse

N EW CASTLE UN I V ERSI TY
ED UCATI ON , COM M UN I CATI ON AN D LAN GUAGE SCI EN CES:

SPEECH AN D LAN GUAGE SECTI ON
M A I N CROSS- CULTURAL COM M UN I CATI ON S

AN D I N TERN ATI ON AL RELATI ON S
Re se a r ch Por t folio
LEV EL M
Goodby e I ndon e sia : A Cr it ica l D iscour se Ana lysis of

A D ocum e nt a r y Film by Al- Ja ze e r a English
2 8 August 2 0 1 3
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I de cla r e t ha t t his subm ission is w holly m y ow n w or k a nd t ha t I ha ve

a dhe r e d t o t he Un ive r sit y r e gula t ions r e ga r ding t he a ck now le dge m e n t
of ot he r s’ w or k
__________________
Maria Leodora i
Goodbye Indonesia: A Critical Discourse Analysis of A Documentary Film by Al-Jazeera English
ABSTRACT
This study examines a documentary film broadcast by Al-Jazeera English, titled “Goodbye
Indonesia”. By employing Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), this study aims to demonstrate
how the filmmaker’s ideology was implemented through a skilful use of narrative strategies
and structures in representing ‘reality’ on the on-going conflict in West Papua, Indonesia.
The results of this study show the subjectivity and one-sided story within the narrative
structure in portraying Indonesians as the negative other-representation and West Papuans
as the positive self-representation. The findings and implications of this study will provide a
better understanding of the role of mass media, particularly documentary film, in the
articulation of knowledge, power and discourse in society, and in the construction and
representation of identities in a socio-political context.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Introduction 1
2. Review of Literature 2
2.1 Documentary Film 3
2.2 Narrative in the Documentary 5
2.3 Discursive Construction of ‘us’ and ‘them’ 6
3. Methodology 7
3.1 Analytical Procedure 7
3.2 Data Collection 8
3.3 Methodological Approach 9
3.4 Reliability and Validity 9
3.5 Ethical Considerations 9
4. Results 10
4.1 Characterisation 10
4.1.1 Main Characters 10
4.1.2 Supporting Characters 11
4.2 Plot Summary 11
4.3 Main Themes 13
4.3.1 The Sovereignty of Indonesia 13
4.3.2 The Oppressed People of West Papua 14
5. Discussion 16
6. Conclusion 18
Bibliography 19
Appendices
Appendix 1: AJE’s Website Viewership Profile 25
Appendix2: Goodbye Indonesia YouTube Video Statistics 27
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TABLE OF FIGURES
Figure 1. “Kami bukan Indonesia; kami Bangsa Papua” 15
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1. INTRODUCTION
In 1969, West Papua1, which was formerly a Dutch colony, has officially become a territory
of the Republic of Indonesia, through the “Act of Free Choice”2 voting event, with full
recognition from the United Nations (Saltford, 2003; Simpson, 2004; Chauvel and Bhakti,
2004). However, claiming this event as a sham, the people of West Papua, through several
local activist organizations, have since continued striving for their independence and have
demanded a referendum to exercise their right to self-determination (Saltford, 2003).
Moreover, with the continuing conflicts between West Papuan rebels and the Indonesian
Government, the Indonesian military has frequently been accused of human rights abuses,
such as the killing and torturing of many West Papuans (Human Rights Watch, 2009) and
the alleged employment of diplomatic leverage to keep the plight of the Papuans off the
international agenda (Kirksey, 2012).
Furthermore, since the international media is bannedby the Indonesian Government from
entering and covering stories from West Papua, much speculation has emerged on what is
happening there. Al-Jazeera English (AJE), an international TV network and channel,
managed to send two independent journalists, one of whom was a filmmaker, to secretly
cover a story from West Papua with the help of a local activist organization, the KNPB3,
during November – December, 2012. Travelling undercover as tourists, they produced a
short documentary film titled Goodbye Indonesia, which was later broadcast as part of the
programme People and Power,4 and also published on AJE’s website and YouTube
account. The purpose of this film, as stated at the beginning of the particular episode of the
programme, was to find out why “ever since Indonesia took over the territory of West Papua,
the West Papuan activists have been locked in a life or death struggle for independence.”
1
The western half of the New Guinea island, formerly known as Irian Jaya. Its official name is Papua, and it is divided into
two provinces: Papua and West Papua. However, many people refer to both provinces collectively as West Papua. This
study will further use Papua and West Papua interchangeably in referring to the region and the people.
2
Conducted by the Indonesian Government, supervised by the United Nations, and mediated by the USA (Simpson, 2004).
3
The KNPB (KomiteNasional Papua Barat/West Papua National Committee) is a West Papuan civic independence
movement focused on both organizing non-violent mass protest and making the international world aware of the West
Papuan plight.
4
The documentary was broadcast on 30 January 2013 and repeated throughout the week.
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By focusing on the discourse and certain visual features of this one particular documentary,
this study aims to analyse the narrative strategies used by the filmmaker as an attempt to
portray the real situation in West Papua. The study also aims to demonstratehow the
filmmaker’s ideologyplays a significant role in structuring and framing the film, which
eventually persuadesthe viewers to take sides. Although a considerable number of studies
on the nature of media have been done in Indonesia, most are focused on newspapers,
news talks or political debates and, as far as is known, less attention has been paid to the
case of documentaries, especially on the subject of the West Papua conflict. Therefore, this
paper seeks to make a modest contribution to the discourse analysis collective discipline
and offer a further understanding of how ideology is manifested in media discourse in
general, and documentary film in particular.
2. THE REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE
Most of the work of media analysis explores the constructionist approach when discussing
how language and culture have been fundamental to the key concept of representation (Hall,
1997; Helsby, 2005). There are two major modelswith this approachwhich are often
employed by media analysts. The first is semiotics, which provides a method for analysing
how visual representations convey meaning and where representation is understood on the
basis of the way words function as signs within language. This model wasinfluenced by
Ferdinand de Saussure and later developed by Roland Barthes5into a wider field of signs
and representationsto show how languages work in society visually, verbally and non-
verbally (Helsby, 2005; Hall, 1997).
The secondmodel is the discursive one coined by Michel Foucault. This model focuses more
upon issues of power and knowledge, and emphasises cultural understanding and shared
5
Barthes’ (1960) semiotic approach is interpretative and more concerned with the ‘play’ of meaning by a scientific analysis
of language rules and laws (Hall, 1997).
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meanings (Helsby, 2005; Hall, 1997).As it is also often associated with the post-structuralist
and post-modernist approaches, Foucault’s concern for discourse and discursive formations
helped to link ‘culture’ to ‘representation’, and thus culture to the media texts which represent
the world in the ‘information age’ (Castells, 2010; Hobbs, 2008; Helsby, 2005). This
approach will be a vital part of this study’s analysis of a documentary as an institutional
practice, in whichthe documentary serves as one of the principal mediums of imparting
knowledge through the various discourses employed within it (see Nichols, 1991). This
approach will help to see the representation of knowledge, and the context in which such
representations are given form, meaning and, ultimately, application (Hobbs, 2008; Hall,
1997).
2.1. Documentary Film
According to Grierson (1966), documentary film can be defined as a “creative treatment of
actuality” since it has the potential to observelife in a new art form with the ‘original’ actor
and the ‘original’ scene serving as guides to interpret the modern world (Plantinga, 1997).
However, a filmmaker, Satyajit Ray,disputed this idea and pointed out that even fables,
myths and fairy tales have their roots in reality and are also creative interpretations of reality
(Jacobs, 1971:381, as cited in Plantinga, 1997).
Nevertheless, in an attempt to define documentary film, Nichols (2001:1) suggests that every
film is a documentary, and thus proposes two categories of film: (1) documentaries of wish-
fulfilment, normally called fiction, and (2) documentaries of social representation, which are
typically called non-fiction. Despite the latter documentary often being used as a source of
knowledge for their assumedstatus as evidence from the world, Nichols points out that there
is always a need to assess their claims and statements (2001; 1991). Likewise, Renov
(1993:2)also points out that documentaries contain ‘fictive’ elements through the use of
language, narration or musical accessory to gain emotional impact from the viewer.
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Therefore, the documentary form, according to Renov, has struggled to find its place
between “truth and beauty”.
However, Bruzzi (2006) strongly criticises Nichols and Renov by arguing that sometimes it
becomes necessary to remind ourselves that reality does exist and that it can be
represented without such a representation having to be exactly synonymous with the reality
that preceded it (p.5). Bruzzi sees the documentary form as contributing to meaning about
real world events and argues that it does not perceive its ultimate aim to be the authentic
representation of the real through an examination of its components (Ibid:13). Bruzzi claims
that the documentary is born between the real and its representation; thus, rather than
perceive this as a problem that must be surmounted, she suggests that we should accept
this propensity towards a dialectical understanding of the factual world to be an asset and a
virtue (2006:13).
However, as many post-modernist critics point out,any attempt at representing the real is
questionable and, thus, when screening a documentary, the audience is not watching reality,
but a recorded representation of what it once was. Bennet (2005), by referring to Jean
Baudrillard’s hyperrealism6, strongly argues that if an object needs a representation, then it
is part of that logic that the representation is not its object (p.307).Moreover, documentaries
are considered to be subjective devices based on the interpretation of the filmmaker and
deliberately used to shape meaning and support a point of view about something
(Rosenstone, 1988:1175; Blain and O’Donnel, 2003:23; Miller, 1998:183).
Furthermore, Baudrillard (1983) once pointed out that if reality is always mediated through
representational devices, such as documentaries, the question then becomes how close a
documentary can come to representing reality, rather than whether it can capture it perfectly.
6
According to Baudrillard, hyperreality is “the generation by models of a real without origin or reality” (1994:1).
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On the subject of representing reality, Roy Stryker (Stott, 1973:29) argues that “a good
documentary film should tell not only what a place or a thing or a person looks like, but it
must also tell the audience what it would feel like to be an actual witness to the scene (cited
in Hall, 1997:83).In other words, in order to be an effective representational medium,
documentary films must make viewers feel as if they were co-present to the recorded
reality.Accordingly, (telling) stories are an important element of documentaries in order to
engage with the audience on an emotional and intellectual level, and to build curiosity for
what will happen next.
2.2. The Narrative in Documentaries
Any film that recounts a chronology of events makes use of a narrative structure (Plantinga,
1997). Thus, narrative remains the most pervasive method of organization in the non-fiction
film since narrative is a fundamental mode of explanation with roots in the human need to
represent events and history to others (Ibid; Riessman, 1993).
However, according to White (1987:ix), “narrative is not merely a neutral discursive form […]
to represent real events in their aspect as developmental processes but rather entails
ontological and epistemic choices with distinct ideological and even specifically political
implications”. Furthermore, narrative discourse is considered as a mythical view of reality, a
conceptual “content” which, when used to represent real events, provides an illusory
coherence and characteristic of dreaming rather than of waking thought; it is far from being a
neutral medium for the representation of historical events and processes (Ibid:ix).
Furthermore, most narrative studies are holistic in nature, paying attention to the sequencing
of themes, thus foregrounding the “specifically narrative aspects of texts’ meaning” (Squire,
2008:50) and preserving “the sequential and structural features that are hallmarks of
narrative” (Riessman, 2008:12). Narrative studies, as will also be further employed by this
study,focus on both form and content:what is said and how it is told.Accordingly, by looking
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at the organization, patterns and function of the film’s narrative, this study will compose a
close examination of the characters, events, and main themes of the documentary as part of
its narrative strategies.
In addition to that, since there has been recognition that narrative is central to the
representation of identity, self-representation or the collective identity of groups such as
regions, nations, race and gender (Currie, 1998:2), this study will also take notice of the
film’s narratives as the instrument by which to accomplish particular social ends, such as the
construction of identities and ability to persuade audiences (see, for example, May, 2008; De
Fina and Georgakopoulo, 2008:382; Pedriana, 2006; Squire et al., 2008:4).
2.3. Discursive Construction of ‘Us’ and ‘Them’
The mass media, including documentary films, often build specific tools and instruments to
say more in the minimum space possible in order to represent ‘reality’ and frame identities
(Browne et al., 2010). One way to accomplish this is by establishing an in-/out-group
dichotomy.
Individuals categorize themselves and the people around them into a binary opposition of ‘us
and them’ based on various grounds such as ideology, ethnicity, and religion (Sowinska and
Dubroskaya, 2012; van Dijk, 1998). The in-group, which constitutes a collective ‘we’, refers
to friends, community, and closeness with others, while the out-group constitutes a collective
‘they’ and refers to the enemy or outsiders, who are to be held at a distance (Sowinska and
Dubroskaya, 2012:450; Mansson, 2008:159). Therefore, for the purpose of this study, it is
essential to recognise that the in-group and the out-group areassociatedwith positive and
negative attribution.
Moreover, it is also crucial to know what purposes are often served by the implementation of
the in-/out-group dichotomy. A number of studies on media representation involving the
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discursive construction of ‘us’ and ‘them’ indicatethat several goals are implied by the author
of the discourse in maintaining certain ideologies in society. A study conducted by Harding
(2006) on the historical representation of aboriginal people in the Canadian news media
shows that the in-/out-group dichotomy is often used to advocate ‘old stereotypes’ of
aboriginal people as ‘emotional’ and ‘violent’, to justify the prejudgments and actionsof the
elites, and to blockpossibilities of interpretation of news stories by audiences. Likewise, van
Dijk (2006), on the subject of discourse and manipulation in media, emphasizes that
although the goals and intention of a speaker may not be explicit, binary opposition is often
used, for example, to manipulate an audience into accepting beliefs, to legitimate violence,
and to constructa positive image of the speaker as a fighter against evil, in orderto discredit
the opponent and unite their community.
Furthermore, to sum up, a discursive construction of ‘us’ and ‘them’ wrapped with a skilful
use of narrative structures and strategies, conveyed through a decent framing of
documentary film, and broadcast through a recognised media institution,can make a
powerful statement of information and shape viewers’perceptions and interpretations in line
with the goals of the filmmaker and their institution.Therefore, “to be a journalist, or other
media producer, is to be powerful, with the institutional devices and techniques of the media
intimately intertwined in the complicated embrace of power/knowledge” (Hobbs, 2008:12).
Thus, it is necessary to assess their statements and assertions, their perspectives and
arguments, and decide whether they are worthy of our belief, because, as Nichols (2001:1)
points out, documentaries of social representation convey ‘truths’ if we decide they do.
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3. METHODOLOGY
3.1. Analytical Procedure
This study aims to analyse the narrative strategies of one documentary film by AJE in
representing the reality of West Papuans’ drive for independence from Indonesia. Therefore,
this study willtry to answer the following questions:
- What kinds of images about West Papuans and Indonesians are portrayed in this
documentary film?
- What sorts of narrative strategies are used by the filmmaker in order to portray such
images?
Additionally, two sub-questions were also developed to obtain responses to the main
questions: how are specific persons or social groups in this film named, labelled and referred
to, linguistically? Also, from what perspective are these attributions expressed?
In order to address these questions, this study will investigate the point of view of the
filmmaker, the characterization, plot (events of the story), and the discursive construction of
‘us’ and ‘them’ by looking at the choice of words as well as the use of rhetorical figures. This
study will also consider the visual signs (i.e. screenshots of banners, posters) used as
instruments to support what the (spoken) text aims to achieve.
3.2. Data Collection
This study is a small-scale research with a 25-minute documentary film, titled “Goodbye
Indonesia” taken from AJE’s website,as the data source.7 This one particular film was
chosen because, being produced and broadcast by an internationally known TV news
network, it has made a strong reference to the ‘reality’ in Papua, especially since there has
been a lack of direct official news coverage, as a result of the restriction on journalists. This
film can be accessed not only through the broadcast TV programme, but has also been and
7
The film can be accessed through the following web link:
http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/2013/01/201313018313632585.html
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will be accessed by a relatively high number of international viewers, through AJE’s website
and YouTube account. It has the potential, therefore, to shape their perspective on the
topic,8and is considered worthy of critical examination.
3.3. Methodological Approach
This study employs qualitative research using Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). Ideologies
and social representations, which will be further analysed in this study, are ‘social’ because
they are socially shared (van Dijk, 1998); therefore, CDA is considered a suitable method for
this research as it sees language as a form of ‘social practice’ (Fairclough, 1989:18), and
considers discourse to be socially constructive (Chouliaraki and Fairclough, 1999). CDA
discards the concept that discourse reflects ‘reality’ (Fairclough, 1989) and explores
discourse as a means of practising power by one group over another (e.g. van Dijk, 1998;
Wodak and Meyer, 2009).
3.4. Reliability and Validity
By employing CDA as the research method, this study is aware of the kind of judgments that
will be made which will have much to do with opinions and values. However, Flowerdew
(1999:1091) points out that research approaches in the social sciences and humanities have
been adapted towards an acceptance of probabilistic interpretation and diversity of opinion.
More profoundly, “pragmatics, which underpins all discourse analysis […] is concerned
withimplicature, not facts” (Ibid).Furthermore, Lakoff (1990) suggests that where there are
ambiguities and multiple possibilities, CDA should put forward alternatives and argue for the
most plausible. Accordingly, “by familiarising oneself with the situation of the text, one is able
to interpret it; but at the same time, in analysing the micro features of the text one also gains
insights into the situation in which it was produced” (Flowerdew, 1999:1093). Nevertheless,
in order to maintain reliability in the research process, a constant movement back and forth
between theory and observed data is necessary (Wodak, 2010).
8
See appendix 1 and 2 for AJE’s website and YouTube account viewership profile.
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3.5. Ethical Considerations
There are no major ethical issues to be considered since the data were taken from a public
domain (the website of AJE).
4. RESULTS
Goodbye Indonesia is a film made by Dom Rotheroe,9 who has a track record of making
documentaries on the subject of civil war, conflicts and injustice in several countries. The title
itself, rhetorically, is an expression of leave-taking addressed to Indonesia, and in this
context it comes from the West Papuans and implies that the filmmaker is in favour of West
Papuan separation from Indonesia. Moreover, the characterisation, plot, and themes of the
film also communicate the standpoint of the filmmaker, as will be further discussed.
4.1. Characterisation
4.1.1. Main characters
The central character of the story was Victor Yeimo, the chairman of KNPB. He was
portrayed as a young warrior of justice and a good moral character through his role as a
non-violent activist of independence.The other main character was the narrator, Rotheroe
himself,who is an off-cameracharacter and is heard but not seen.In telling the story,
Rotheroeperformed as a first-person narrator who revealed the plot by referring to himself as
‘I’, or, when plural, ‘we’. Although unseen,this character also performed actionsand, through
his narration, expressed opinions and made judgments. Additionally, through his
commentary, he also significantly added information which enhancedthe stories told and
actionsperformed by other characters. Therefore, viewers become aware of the events and
characters of the documentary through the narrator’s view and knowledge.Speaking in the
9
Dom Rotheroe is an award-winning British filmmaker. He has made several internationally award winning films and
documentaries, including The Coconut Revolution, a documentary about a conflict around Bougainville island of Papua New
Guinea (see http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0745180/awards or
http://www.blinkbox.com/People/40086/Dom-Rotheroe).
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first person, Rotheroe edged the documentarytowards being a sort of diary. According to
Nichols (2001:14) what is expressed in this diary kind of approach is the filmmaker’s own
personal perspective, and what makes it a documentary is that “this expressiveness remains
coupled to representations about the social world that are addressed to viewers”.
4.1.2. Supporting Characters
Additionally, there were two significant supporting characters that make an important
contribution to the film’s storyline. First,there was the consulting expert, Jennifer Robinson,
an international lawyer for West Papua;interview segments with her were inserted several
times during some scenes to provide supporting commentary about the conditions in West
Papua. Secondly, there was the prominent local pro-independent figure, Rev.
SokratezYoman, who isan outspoken critic of the Indonesian role and the author of several
banned books about West Papua. Referring to Nichols (2001:50), these two characters
mightserve asdemonstrative evidence, and this is part of the artistic proofrequired to
generate the impression of conclusiveness of what is happening in Papua.
Moreover, there were also a number of other supporting characters, including Rotheroe’s
counterpart, Sally Collister, who did most of the interviews and explained some of the
situations to the camera, as well as other members/activists of the KNPB. However, from all
the characters that emerged, none represented Indonesia’s side. The characterisations of
Indonesians werebased on narration, stories and archive footage only.
4.2. Plot Summary
The overall storyline was about two undercover foreign journalists who travelled around the
city of Jayapura and Wamena in Papua. While in Jayapura, they travelled with Victor Yeimo,
who was in hiding and moving from one safe house to another because he was continuously
receiving terror messages from the police. After Yeimo was arrested during a public
pilgrimage to commemorate the anniversary of the first Papuan flag raising, the journalists
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flew to Wamena andmet a local tribe whose chief was one of the voting men on the ‘Act of
Free Choice’. Although the police had somehow managed to locate and interrogate them in
Wamena, the two journalists were able to leave the city safely. The film ended with the
information that Yeimohad finally been released, and the conclusion that the Papuans’ fight
for freedom was yet to resolve.
The storyline portrayed a terrifying situation in West Papua and propagated the idea of
intimidatory acts by thepolice force. The filmmaker playedon this by opening and closing the
film with scenes of oneWest Papuan tribal group,whom they met in the story, chanting
verses of a song, The Cry, in their native language.10The narrator explained that the song
was the message that the West Papuanswere “desperate for the world to hear” as it was a
form of lamentation for those who had died in their fight for independence.
What is also worth noting from the storyline is that the development of the story relied
heavily on what was told by the narrator or interviewees rather than being a balanceof
information with the footage on screen. For example, there were events when Yeimo and
other activists, along with the journalists, weredescribed as hiding and running away from
the police, who were chasing them. However, while the scenes showed they were in a
moving car or rushing into the bushes, none of the scenes actuallyshowedpolice chasing or
following them. Likewise, whenYeimo identifiedcertain people riding motorcycles on the
street as the intelligence unit who were spying on them, there were no strong grounds for
viewers to be sure of this assertion, as the riders could have been anyone riding on the
street. A similarlyunsubstantiated point was when the narrator and Collisterinformed the
viewers that the police hadjust interrogated them in their hotel; the information was based
only on their narration to the camera.
10
The film uses English subtitles.
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4.3. Main themes
According to Seymour (1978), narrative discourse consists of a connected sequence of
narrative statements, where a ‘statement’ is relatively independent of the particular
expressive medium. Therefore, the analysis that follows will consider the main themes that
emerge from statement to statement within the narrative composed altogether by the
filmmaker, in order to implement his ideological strategy through the in-/out-group
dichotomy. Two major themes that arise from the film are the sovereignty of Indonesia and
the oppressed people of West Papua.
4.3.1. The Sovereignty of Indonesia
Since the beginning of the film, Indonesia was named, labelled and referred to as the
dominant group which has the arbitrary power to rule over the West Papuans. Most of the
words used for naming Indonesians were linked to ‘authoritative’ figures, such as the police,
the military, the security forces, the intelligence, etc.The use of certain names and labels
referring to Indonesia enabled the interviewees (and the narrator), through their stories as
eye-witnesses, to relate Indonesia with several actions which it was capable of doing. To
exemplify, the following excerptsare statements from Victor Yeimo.
“Because theyknow our posts, they have placedmany intelligence here […] They are
spying, monitoring all activity here.”
“The militarycame when I was a child. Came to my village, and theykilled people […]
Theyforced people: “You have to hold white/red – Indonesian flag”. If they didn’t sing the
Indonesian national song, they were killed, in front of me. When I was a child I saw it myself.”
These sentences reflect how the Indonesian police had the abilityand right to monitor
people’s lives, and more importantly hadthe power not only to arrest, butalso to torture and
kill people.Likewise, after interviewing one of the KNPB activists, the narrator gavethe
following information regarding what happened to the interviewee afterwards.
“[…] two weeks after this interview, Hubertus Mabel, a founding member of the KNPB was
shot dead by the security forces.”
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Both the attribution and bad actions referring to Indonesia were continuouslyemphasized in
order to signify to viewers the wickedness of Indonesia.
In addition to the above findings, other Indonesians who live in Papua andwho might not be
on the authority level were referred to as outsiders, with migrants and immigrantsbeing the
most commonly used words:
“Look around all the streets here and in terms of the economy […] who dominates here? It’s
the migrants. It’s Indonesians, not Papuans.”
“If you go around, you just see immigrants from outside; a lot of Indonesians.”
The above excerpts of statements from Rev. Yoman and Yeimo11reflect how Indonesians
are considered foreigners who have taken over their land and,in this way,the otherness of
Indonesians becomes more explicit.
4.3.2. The Oppressed People of West Papua
In portraying the positive self-representation, the narrator and interviewees mostly used the
strategy of victimization as a tool to gain sympathy from the viewers.Therefore, mostof the
words used to describe West Papuans were linked to people who suffer and strive to fight
back. For example, the following excerpt shows how Rev. Yoman, by using metaphors (van
Dijk, 2006), described how the Papuans have been marginalised by the ruling Indonesians:
“The Papuan people have become guests in their own land […] The Papuan people may
have all been wiped out…”
Moreover, other rhetoric used by the figures wasutilized to establish the binary opposition.
For example,Yeimo illustrated how the people of West Papua had been suffering in the
conflict by using personification,and by describing how discrimination happened in West
Papua by using simile12:
“This land is silent. We kept our sufferingsilent for long years.”
“Indonesia makes us look like animalsin West Papua. We don’t want it.”
11
The film rendered English subtitles for most of the spoken discourse, although both Yeimo and Rev. Yoman were
speaking, mainly, in English. The excerpts quoted here are based on the subtitles.
12
A figure of speech in which two essentially unlike things are compared, often in a phrase introduced by like or as (The
American Heritage Dictionary of English Language, 2009).
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Similarly, the following excerpt from ‘The Cry” exemplifiesanother use of rhetoric, which
servednot only as lamentation but also as a statement of ownership of the land which
Indonesia had taken away:
“This is our home, but weare no longer at homehere.”
Furthermore, the Papuans are also portrayed as being keen for their voices to be heard,
especially by the international world. The following screenshot shows how they expressed
their standpoint.
Figure 1: “Kami bukan Indonesia; kami Bangsa Papua”
The scene shows one of the members of the KNPB holding a cardboard with a statement (in
Indonesian),“We are not Indonesians” with the Indonesian flag as the background, and “We
are Papuans”, with the Papuan flag as the background. It strongly expresses their position
that, as Papuan people, they are not,and are different from,Indonesians. Moreover, they
were willing to strive for their freedom even at the expense of their lives, as shown from the
excerpt below, as stated by a KNPB member:
“As long as Indonesia refuses to recognise us, refuses to give us a chance, the KNPB will
continue to organise the public to rebel. There’s no other way. We will rebel, rebel, rebel. If
13
we don’t get independence, we may as well alldie.”
13
This statement was spoken in Indonesian; the excerpt is based on the English subtitle.
15
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Another excerpt from ‘The Cry’demonstrates their wish that the world should hear their
plight:
“We hope that you will take our cry with you to the world.”
The images of the Papuans were thus portrayed not only through their sorrow as victims, but
also through their strong standpoint for freedom and hopethat the world will acknowledge
them.
5. DISCUSSION
To answer the two research questions, this study has presented and analysed some of the
elements of the documentary, which include the (spoken) texts and visual features.
Therefore,answering the first question, Indonesians are portrayed asvillainous, the powerful
outsider who arbitrarily took over the land of Papua, while the West Papuans are the weak
and oppressed, who are also striving to fight back as warriors of justice.This answer was
also derived from the consideration of the filmmaker’s perspective. Considering the
background and the track record, the filmmaker’s concept of morality was, arguably, formed
the foundation of the making of the film; his moral solidarity to the West Papuans made him
feel as if he were part of the in-group and thus opposed the Indonesians, especially the
government, through the medium of thisdocumentary. This led to a continuous alarmed tone
of the partisan interviewees, added to the historical footage (both pictures and videos) which
favoured West Papua, throughout the film. All the characters involved were for the
independence of West Papua. No attempt was made to give voice to Indonesians, not even
the local Indonesians who live in Papua, let alone the government representative. It all thus
indicates that the filmmaker, from the beginning, indeed aimed to have a one-sided story.
The images portrayed of Indonesia and West Papua show the skilful use of narrative
strategies and framing by the filmmaker, which lead the analysis to answering the second
research question.Images of Indonesia and West Papua are represented by
characterisation, plot and themes in the narrative. The characterisation of the film
16
Maria Leodora 17
emphasises the heroism of West Papuans, represented only by some of the members of the
KNPB and one Papuan tribe, in striving for their independence, but which the filmmaker
witnesses first-hand and narrates to the viewers. The plot of the story shows both the
inartistic and artistic evidence (Nichols, 2001:50) the filmmaker tries to present in order to
strengthen his standpoint. Although there were witnesses and documents (photographs and
archive footage) were shown as inartistic proof, the sequence of events also shows a large
amount of artistic proofwhich was crafted and framed by the filmmaker in order to appeal
viewers. For example, there were portions of events where the West Papuans spoke with
their own voices by telling stories as eyewitnesses through interviews to convince viewers.
However, the film employed multi-layered narratives, where the characters/interviewees
narrated stories to the narrator, and the narrator then re-told it to viewers. Therefore, the
stories were actually filtered twice. Moreover, also of note is the way the filmmaker wrapped
the film by presenting pieces of ‘The Cry’ verses in the beginning and at the end of the story.
This technique conveyed the message that the film itself was ‘the cry’ song of all West
Papuans to be free,and is an instance of generalisation(van Dijk, 2004; Amirian et al.,
2012),despite the fact that West Papua consists of more than just one tribe.14Furthermore,
the main themes that emerge show consistent rhetorical moves in constructing the binary
opposition between Indonesia and West Papua, as if they were enemies, and persuadingthe
viewers to take sides.
Referring to what Nichols15 (2001) points out, this documentary has utilized three types of
artistic proof as part of its narrative strategies. The first is ethical, by generating an
impression of the good moral character of West Papuans. The second is emotional, by
establishing a favourable frame of mind to appeal to the audience’s emotions to produce the
desired disposition. The third is demonstrative, which uses apparent reasoning by the
explanation of professional experts, such as Jennifer Robinson.
14
Papua is home to around 312 different tribes (http://www.survivalinternational.org/tribes/papuan).
15
Nichols was referring to Aristotle’s rhetoric which is relevant to documentary practice.
17
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Nevertheless, the overall findings also show that the storyline of the film did not completely
answer the question stated in the opening of the particular programme in which the
documentary was aired, and thus seems to undermine the main purpose. The purpose of the
film could have been achieved to a greater level if there had been a genuine effort to include
the voice of Indonesians, or even better the representatives of the United Nations and/or the
United States, in the process of making the film.16
6. CONCLUSION
To conclude, the findings of this study have shown that a documentary study, along with the
utilization of CDA, can help us examine the discourse of power within media texts and the
embedded ideologies within its structures and strategies. Despite its assertion as a truth-
telling device, the documentary of social representation is inherently subjective. No matter
how objective a filmmaker approaches a topic, they will always be filtering the topic through
their own personal lens. As many documentary theorists have argued, a documentary is
represented through a scientific discourse, which reifies the genre into a powerful tool for
subjectivising certain groups within media texts (Arneson, 2012).
Nevertheless, as a small-scale study focusingon onlyone documentary film, the results of
this paper are thus unlikely to be used asa generalisation of all documentaries of social
representation, especially in the wider socio-political context. Therefore, it would be
beneficialin further research to study a larger corpus of documentaries within the same topic
of coverage to learn their discursive pattern of representation and, if possible, to interview
the filmmakers and/or the producers to obtain a clearer understanding of the underlying
ideas and concepts of their productions.
16
After the film was first broadcast, the Indonesian Government responded and urged AJE for a balanced report, and this
led AJE to conduct an interview with a Government representative on 1 February 2013 (see www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-
pacific/2013/02/201321174145567896.html). A small part of the interview was later attached to the ending of the film.
18
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APPENDIX 1
AJE’s Website Viewership Profile
a. The demographic profile of AJE’s website

(source: http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/aljazeera.com)
The profile shows that people who are located in the United States and United
Kingdom are the top two visitors by country of AJE’s website in general.
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b. Goodbye Indonesia’sresponses profile on AJE’s website
The video of Goodbye Indonesia on AJE’s website has 3,749 likes/recommendations

through Facebook, 894 shares through Twitter, 57 shares through Google+, and 188
comments.
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APPENDIX 2
Video Statistics of AJE’sPeople & Power YouTube Account on “Goodbye Indonesia”.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLdyDXXPAZs)
This YouTube video has 17,199 views. The statistics shows the increasing number of views
up to August 2013.
27

GOODBYE INDONESIA A Critical Discourse

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N EW CASTLE UN I V ERSI TY

ED UCATI ON , COM M UN I CATI ON AN D LAN GUAGE SCI EN CES:

M A I N CROSS- CULTURAL COM M UN I CATI ON S

Goodby e I ndon e sia : A Cr it ica l D iscour se Ana lysis of

I de cla r e t ha t t his subm ission is w holly m y ow n w or k a nd t ha t I ha ve

structure in portraying Indonesians as the negative other-representation and West Papuans

representation of identities in a socio-political context.

2.1 Documentary Film 3

2.2 Narrative in the Documentary 5

2.3 Discursive Construction of ‘us’ and ‘them’ 6

3.1 Analytical Procedure 7

3.2 Data Collection 8

3.3 Methodological Approach 9

3.4 Reliability and Validity 9

3.5 Ethical Considerations 9

4.1.1 Main Characters 10

4.1.2 Supporting Characters 11

4.2 Plot Summary 11

4.3 Main Themes 13

4.3.1 The Sovereignty of Indonesia 13

4.3.2 The Oppressed People of West Papua 14

Figure 1. “Kami bukan Indonesia; kami Bangsa Papua” 15

demanded a referendum to exercise their right to self-determination (Saltford, 2003).

international agenda (Kirksey, 2012).

happening there. Al-Jazeera English (AJE), an international TV network and channel,

during November – December, 2012. Travelling undercover as tourists, they produced a

eventually persuadesthe viewers to take sides. Although a considerable number of studies

and offer a further understanding of how ideology is manifested in media discourse in

general, and documentary film in particular.

2. THE REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

verbally (Helsby, 2005; Hall, 1997).

approach will be a vital part of this study’s analysis of a documentary as an institutional

practice, in whichthe documentary serves as one of the principal mediums of imparting

2.1. Documentary Film

According to Grierson (1966), documentary film can be defined as a “creative treatment of

(Jacobs, 1971:381, as cited in Plantinga, 1997).

between “truth and beauty”.

Baudrillard’s hyperrealism6, strongly argues that if an object needs a representation, then it

(Rosenstone, 1988:1175; Blain and O’Donnel, 2003:23; Miller, 1998:183).

in Hall, 1997:83).In other words, in order to be an effective representational medium,

reality.Accordingly, (telling) stories are an important element of documentaries in order to

what will happen next.

2.2. The Narrative in Documentaries

represent events and history to others (Ibid; Riessman, 1993).

implications”. Furthermore, narrative discourse is considered as a mythical view of reality, a

its narrative strategies.

representation of identity, self-representation or the collective identity of groups such as

Fina and Georgakopoulo, 2008:382; Pedriana, 2006; Squire et al., 2008:4).

2.3. Discursive Construction of ‘Us’ and ‘Them’

(Browne et al., 2010). One way to accomplish this is by establishing an in-/out-group

the in-/out-group dichotomy. A number of studies on media representation involving the

of the discourse in maintaining certain ideologies in society. A study conducted by Harding

elites, and to blockpossibilities of interpretation of news stories by audiences. Likewise, van

the opponent and unite their community.

use of narrative structures and strategies, conveyed through a decent framing of

documentary film, and broadcast through a recognised media institution,can make a

powerful statement of information and shape viewers’perceptions and interpretations in line

intimately intertwined in the complicated embrace of power/knowledge” (Hobbs, 2008:12).

3.1. Analytical Procedure

this study willtry to answer the following questions:

instruments to support what the (spoken) text aims to achieve.

3.2. Data Collection