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Abstract
The rapid expansion of the Internet, marked by a storm of blogs and social networking platforms, is perceived as an enabling instrument for Muslims to be engaged globally. In this regard, the blogosphere can be a vehicle for worldwide interactions and the formation of global Muslim community, the ummah. While this idea is enchanting, this article shows that such an idea needs judicious scrutiny. Using three prominent cases from Indonesia, this article tries to explore the ways in which Muslim bloggers in Indonesia use this new flexible form to be engaged in conversations that are related to Islam and to answer the following questions: How do the features of the blogosphere influence discussions on Islam related issues? Does the promise of a “global village” change the dynamics of Muslim communities in Indonesia? Does the blogosphere perpetuate a sense of ummah consciousness or does it reinforce nationalism? Does the blogosphere offer promising possibilities for new types of Muslim communities to emerge in the form of globalized community?
Notes
1 Silaturahmi is an Islamic-Indonesian term, it refers to a friendly social communality emphasizing strong family values and mutual solidarity.
2 Ustad or ustād in its original language (Persian) means “a master, teacher, tutor; an artificer, manufacturer, artisan; a barber; ingenious, excellent, celebrated, famed for any art or work of ingenuity; enters into the composition of proper names” (CitationSteingass, 1892). While there is no reference to the term ustad in any classical texts, in Indonesian context it is commonly used for those who teach the religion of Islam.
3In Indonesian, the title of the talk is “Membumikan Islam dengan Cyberdakwah.” In his talk, Ustad Ahmad Sarwat highlighted: (1) The Internet could be an effective means to spread Islam and deepen understanding of Islam; (2) producing more Islamic Web sites and blogs could effectively counter obscene Web sites; (3) the spirit of cyber-dakwah should be followed with the production of sound, attractive, and, if possible, original content; and (4) the lacking of cyber-familiarity among (Islamic) preachers should be seen as an opportunity to bridge them with digital literate Muslims who still feel inadequate to preach in cyberspace (CitationIMB, 2006).
4Metanarrative is a big story, a story of mythic proportions that claims to account for, explain, and subordinate all lesser, little, local narratives (CitationLyotard, 1979). Meta refers to overall, totalizing. Lyotard rejects the narrative that is assumed to be the ultimate universal narrative. CitationFoucault (1972) associates the concept of metanarrative with legitimacy as it can be used as a tool for social and political mobilization against perceived antagonistic, hegemonic forces while it also seeks to create its own hegemony.
5Measured using Quancast.com on April 15, 2012.
6Characterized by convergence, low cost, broad availability, and resistance to control, the Internet is a “convivial medium” that affords a greater scope for freedom, autonomy, creativity, and collaboration than previous media. The first use of the term conviviality to describe the socio-technical landscape of the Internet is found in Lim (2003, p. 274).
7Sources of data: http://www.alexa.com, http://www.compete.com, http://www.multiply.com, http://www.wordpress.com, http://www.socialbakers.com (September 2011). Indonesia's rank on Friendster and Multiply started to go down with the increased growth in Indonesian users of Facebook and Twitter.
11 Bahasa Indonesia is the third most used language in Multiply.com, after English and Tagalog, and the fourth, after English, Spanish, and Portuguese, in Wordpress.com.
12 Friendster.com used to provide a blog feature. But such a feature was eliminated on May 31, 2011, when Friendster was restructured to be a social entertainment site for people to play games and music (CitationWauters, 2011).
13This is consistent with the Multiply's demographic data of American users. Nineteen percent of Multiply users in the United States are Asians, and this figure is much higher (3.9 times) than the average Asian population in other social-networking platforms (CitationQuantcast, 2009).
14The summary of discussions on these three case studies was originated in the observation of 194 blogs consisting of 97 bloggers who are member of the Indonesian Muslim Blogger (IMB) community extracted from the IMB blog aggregator (http://blog.muslimblog.net) and 97 top Muslim bloggers selected from the list of top Indonesian bloggers from http://blogs.indonesiamatters.com. Only blog posts that contained discussions on the events were included in the observation. By the time this article is published, the IMB community Web site is not active. According to the IMB leader, the Web site has undergone a major reconstruction and will be up and running again very soon. Individual blogs of IMB members, however, are still online.
16A Mujahid (Arabic), literally translated as struggler, justice-fighter, or freedom fighter, is a person who is fighting for freedom. The plural is mujahideen. The word is from the same Arabic trilateral as jihad (struggle).
17 Intifada (Arabic), literally translated as the act of shaking off, is commonly used for uprising, rebellion, specifically for an armed uprising of Palestinians against Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip (CitationMerriam-Webster, 2012).