The Development of Laku Lampah Community Existence as a Place

of Historical Interested Members in Surakarta

Afika Fitria Permatasari, RB Soemanto and Supriyadi

Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social and Political Sciences

Sebelas Maret University Surakarta, Indonesia

Keywords: Existence, Community, Laku Lampah, Conservation.

Abstract: Laku Lampah community is one of the communities interested in the historical aspect of Surakarta. This

community was founded by its members who are concerned with the conservation of historical heritage

around their environment. Laku Lampah community brings positive impact on the society. One of such

impacts is that people can find out the history in the villages where they live. This study aims at obtaining

the development of the existence of this community as a history interest group. This study was qualitative

study and used a phenomenon study approach. The techniques of obtaining data were observation, deep

interview, and documentation. Data validation used the triangulation method and data sources. Data analysis

used data reduction, data show, and drawing of the conclusion. The findings showed that this Laku Lampah

community becomes the way of gathering members who are interested in history and its conservation.

Historical site visits become the way for members to interact and discuss about the historical conservation in

the present. This Laku Lampah community could make the people aware and care about historical heritage

around their environment.

1 INTRODUCTION

Surakarta, better known as Solo City, is located in

the Province of Central Java. Solo has a high

potential for historical tourism attractions.

Kasunanan Traditional Palace, Pura

Mangkunegaran, Sriwedari Park, and Balekambang

Park are some examples of the well-known historical

heritage in Solo. Actually, Solo has a high variety of

cultural heritage buildings and historical attractions

which are rarely exposed. Every area of Solo City

has their own characteristics and histories.

Unfortunately, not everyone is aware of it. The

impact is that many people do not know about the

history of the place they live in. This situation has

caused many cultural heritage buildings and

historical sites to be neglected. As point of fact, the

cultural heritage buildings and historical sites such

as old architectural house, former historic buildings,

temples, ancestral graves, and inscriptions are able

to strengthen the potential of historical attractions in

Solo. Realizing many potential places which can be

visited and studied, groups that preserve history

have started to grow in Solo. These groups began to

explore the history of one area after the other, so

others become more aware of the history of their

inhabited places. These groups organize fun learning

activities, which do not just tell the history and

lecture the lessons like school classes. They create

activities that do not bore and make sleepy the

people who want to learn the history of any place in

Solo. The members of such groups who care about

history and want to preserve these historical

buildings are known as Laku Lampah Community.

Laku Lampah Community is one of the history lover

communities in Surakarta. This community tries to

explore and introduce to the public the various

historical sites that are interspersed and existing in

Surakarta through various activities.

The community do not move by itself, or by

merely one or two persons. Communities are run by

people who have the same goals and interests. The

presence of intense communication will create

solidarity among members of the community so that

the community can thrive and survive until the

present. Good relationship will bring solidarity that

is established so that the sense of ownership among

members becomes higher. The existence of a good

relationship among members affects the existence of

Laku Lampah in the local community. To maintain

888

Permatasari, A., Soemanto, R. and Supriyadi, .

The Development of Laku Lampah Community Existence as a Place of Historical Interested Members in Surakarta.

DOI: 10.5220/0007553508880892

In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference Postgraduate School (ICPS 2018), pages 888-892

ISBN: 978-989-758-348-3

the existence of Laku Lampah activity, innovation is

needed for routine agenda in community. People

who are interested in every activity of this

community will never be bored to participate and be

a regular member of Laku Lampah.

In this study, the researchers examined the

development of Laku Lampah community existence

as a community of cultural heritage interested in

Surakarta’s history. The purpose of this study is to

determine the development of Laku Lampah

community as a community interested in cultural

heritage. To analyze the development of Laku

Lampah community, this study used the structures in

Anthony Giddens' structuration theory. This study

was a qualitative research with a phenomenology

study approach. The data collection techniques used

were observation, in-depth interviews and

documentation studies.

2 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This research used a qualitative research method

with phenomenology approach. Phenomenology is a

research strategy in which the researcher identifies

individual experiences related to a particular

phenomenon. Understanding experience makes

phenomenology a research method that requires the

researcher to study a number of subjects and directly

involve themselves to develop patterns and to

conceive relationships (Creswell, 2016). The

application of phenomenology approach in this

research was helpful to explain the development of

Laku Lampah community as a group interested in

the cultural heritage of Surakarta.

Sources of data in this study originated from the

primary data in the form of interviews and

secondary data obtained from documents and

archives owned by Laku Lampah Community.

Purposive sampling is used to determine the sample

of data sources in this study which includes key

informants, main informants and supporting

informants. Purposive sampling is used to determine

the sample of data sources in this study which

includes key informants, main informants and

supporting informants. Data collection techniques

used is observation, in-depth interviews and

documentation. Observations is conducted by

researchers with directly involved in every routine

activities held by Laku Lampah. Interview is

conducted with key informant who is founder of

Laku Lampah, main informant who is member and

management of Laku Lampah and supporting

informant who is Laku Lampah participant. The

documentation used is derived from journals and

articles related to the issues being researched and

related to Laku Lampah. In addition, the

documentation is also a photograph of activities

carried out by the Laku Lampah community.

3 FINDINGS

Laku Lampah Community is one of the historically-

interested communities in Surakarta. The name of

Laku Lampah is derived from the Javanese

Language, which is divided into two words. The first

word means walking, while lampah means walking,

too. If two syllables are combined, Laku Lampah

means walking by tracing and heading to something.

The purpose of the community is to be a place

for people to know more about the heritage in

Indonesia generally and in Solo particularly,

increasing the love and interest in heritage,

becoming an alternative to heritage introduction by

visiting heritage sites and educate the community to

take care and preserve the heritage. The vision of

Laku Lampah is to become a heritage association

that makes people aware and participate in

maintaining and understanding the values of heritage

in Indonesia generally and in Solo particularly.

Additionally, the mission of Laku Lampah is to build

public awareness of the importance of history and

historical heritage, educate people to know and be

eager to maintain historical buildings and spread the

stories of the history to people out there. The focus

of this community is the activities are held every

month. This community started its first activity with

the name Blusukan Ndalem Pengeran event on April

22, 2012.

Since its establishment, Laku Lampah has held

four programs or events. The first program was

Blusukan Solo which, as suggested by the name, was

an activity done by going around Solo or Surakarta.

In this activity, participants were taken around to an

area that has stories and historical sites such as

buildings, ancestral graves, temples, monuments,

and old houses with ancient architecture.

Participants were also given historical stories while

visiting these places. The stories given were usually

obtained from building owners, caretakers, and

community leaders in the area. The second activity

program of Laku Lampah Community was Dolan

Bareng. Dolan Bareng had the same activities with

Blusukan Solo, but the difference lay in the location.

Dolan Bareng focused more on the outside of Solo,

which still has a historical relation with Solo. The

third activity program was Gowes Together. Gowes

The Development of Laku Lampah Community Existence as a Place of Historical Interested Members in Surakarta

889

Together had the same core activities with Blusukan

Solo and Dolan Bareng, but in this activity

participants did not walk but ride a bike to go around

existing historical sites. The last activity was Visit

Museum. This activity was a program devoted to

students. Laku Lampah cooperated with school

parties to invite their students to join on history or

museum tours.

To further develop its existence as a place of

history interested in cultural heritage, Laku Lampah

is required to always innovate in every activity that

it organizes. In addition, to be better known in the

community, Laku Lampah community is also

required to follow the development of technology as

a means promotion. To fulfill all these demands,

certainly, Laku Lampah community must be

innovative so that their existence in society will be

maintained and growing. Based on the research

conducted by the researchers, the development of

Laku Lampah community as a place for cultural

heritage conservation focuses on three things:

creating new activities, innovating in every routine

activity, and utilizing social media as a means of

promotion.

3.1 New Activity

Basically, every activity of the Laku Lampah

community was limited by the participant quota.

This is because the visits in every activity were

conducted house to house. In addition, the

participant quota restrictions were made to facilitate

the participants in listening and understanding the

explanations given by the speakers in each area of

the visits. The average number of participants who

want to participate could not be certainly known

because of quota limitation system. Seeing the

interest of the people who enthusiastically wanted to

follow the activities of Laku Lampah, a founder of

Laku Lampah launched a new activity called

Soerakarta Walking Tour.

While Laku Lampah regularly held an activity

once a month, the Soerakarta Walking Tour was

designed for organizing activities once a week This

is to facilitate the people who wanted to participate

in Laku Lampah activities. Soerakarta Walking Tour

is held in every Saturday starting from 09.00 until

finish. Activities in Soerakarta Walking Tour are

made as minimalist as can be.

In the activities of Laku Lampah, participants are

usually required to pay some money and given

facilities in the form of a short handbook, mineral

water and lunch. Unlike the Soerakarta Walking

Tour, here the participants pay as much as they

could. However, the facilities are only the material

given directly when the activity is done.

3.2 Innovation in Every Activity

In one year, there are 12 activities in Laku Lampah.

Ordinarily within a year, the community organized

two Dolan Bareng activities, 1 activity for Gowes

Bareng, and 9 other activities for Blusukan Solo. All

the activities organized by Laku Lampah community

basically have the core activities in the form of

street-walking and introducing historic sites and

buildings of cultural heritage in the area where the

events are held. To avoid a series of activities that

seem monotonous, community organizers packed

activities into a fun event. Various innovations were

created by the community committee so that the

activities of every month would not be the same.

Innovation was brought by bringing certain themes

and creating a collaboration event with other

communities in Solo. This is certainly adapted to the

chosen theme. For example, in the Blusukan in

Laweyan, this community collaborated with a new

community to introduce traditional Javanese games.

Cooperation had also been arranged with the club of

Putra Putri Solo to travel using Solo City’s tour

transportation and tour agendas to historical tourism

and cultural heritage objects in Solo. Collaboration

with artists incorporated in the cultural record had

also been done. In this collaboration, a show that

tells a few pieces of history stories that exist in Solo

was shown.

With innovations being increasingly attractive in

every series of activities created, Laku Lampah

Community is expected to increase public interest to

learn the history and culture that exist in Solo.

3.3 Social Media as a Promotion Tool

Currently, the development of the digital world is

considered as a very promising media campaign.

With the rapid growth of social media, the reach of

communication among communities becomes easier.

Seeing these opportunities, Laku Lampah

Community utilizes social media as a means of

promotion to introduce more historical and cultural

heritage existing in Solo.

Social media is also used as a means to introduce

Laku Lampah to the public. By using Instagram,

blog, YouTube, and Facebook, the promotion to

introduce the community and all kinds of activities

held by this community becomes easier. With the

ease of people accessing and finding out about this

community through social media, it becomes an

ICPS 2018 - 2nd International Conference Postgraduate School

890

advantage to attract the interest of participants in

following the activities of Laku Lampah.

Communities will not work if they have only one

or two individuals. A community will run and

survive if there are a lot of individuals who manage

it. The existence of Laku Lampah community is

inseparable from the cooperation of the organizers to

develop the activities that constitute the community

activities. With activities being held by the

community, individuals would be attracted to

participate. Increasing individual interest to

participate in every activity of the community, then

the greater the responsibility of community

administrators in the development of their activities

so that the community Laku Lampah itself grows.

The development of Laku Lampah Community will

run indisputably with the role of participating

individuals within the community. It takes a strong

encouragement to develop the existence of the

community because survival alone is not enough.

Laku Lampah community is engaged in history and

cultural heritage. It requires intense communication

and meetings, which create a close relationship

among individuals within Laku Lampah community

to work together in developing the existence of the

community itself.

Agents in Laku Lampah are members and

participants of this community. Those involved in

this community will certainly have close ties and

relationships with each other. This is certainly the

most important key in maintaining the existence of

Laku Lampah community. Agencies have an

important role. Without them, they cannot develop

their existence in society. Basically, members and

participants of Laku Lampah community have

different life backgrounds. This is very influential on

the way they look and think. There will be many

obstacles faced from the diversity of ways of view

and their thinking, but on the other hand, these

differences will also act as the supporting factors

which can form solidarity among them so as to

develop the existence of Laku Lampah Community.

It is important to create solidarity among

members who have different ways of thinking. To

unite them and not to cause conflict, it is necessary

to see the management of Laku Lampah community

as an agency. The agency here controls how the

actions of the agents to form a structure that is none

other than Laku Lampah Community. The

relationship of agents and structures affect the

development of the structure itself. The existence of

solidarity among agents form an intensive

relationship that is in the form of mutual

relationships among members of Laku Lampah

community in each activity. From this, raising rules

and norms as the development of the structure

within Laku Lampah is necessary. If the individual

activities done by the Laku Lampah become more

solid, then it can be said the agent strengthens the

action and makes members identify more with their

roles in the structure. Given a harmonious

relationship among agents, agencies and structures

will reinforce the duality of existing structures. With

good cooperation between members, participants

and administrators will encourage the development

of Laku Lampah community as a growing

community.

4 CONCLUSION

To further develop its existence as a group of people

interested in history and cultural heritage, Laku

Lampah community is required to always innovate

in every activity that it organizes. In addition, to be

better known in society, Laku Lampah community is

also required to follow the development of

technology as a means of promoting itself. Based on

the research that has been done by the researchers,

the development of Laku Lampah community as a

place of cultural heritage interest focuses on three

aspects. The first is New Activity. Laku Lampah

community created a new program called Soerakarta

Walking Tour to facilitate people who have not been

able to participate in community activities of Laku

Lampah. The second is Innovation in Every

activity. To avoid series of activities that seem

monotonous, community organizers packed

activities into a fun event. Innovation was arranged

by bringing certain themes and creating a

collaboration event with other communities in Solo.

The third is Social Media as a Promotion Tool.

Laku Lampah utilized social media as a means of

promotion to introduce more historical and cultural

heritage that exist in Solo.

Social media was also used as a means to

introduce the Laku Lampah Community to the

public. By using Instagram, blog, YouTube, and

Facebook, promotion efforts to introduce the

community and all kinds of activities held this

community became easier.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The researcher would like to thank Prof. Dr. RB.

Soemanto, MA and Dr. Supriyadi SN. SU for the

The Development of Laku Lampah Community Existence as a Place of Historical Interested Members in Surakarta

891

guidance and time for being thesis counselors. The

writers would likte to thank the Laku Lampah

Community, who had helped a lot in this study.

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