LANGUAGE PLANNING AND POLICY

Indonesia has many vernaculars or local languages. As one of the ancestor heritages it needs to be preserved. One of the vernaculars is Bimanese. It is one of the languages that should be preserved so that the part of Indonesian culture exists. The position of Bimanese is the same as other local languages, such as Sasak, Javanese, Balinese and other local languages in Indonesia. Bimanese is primarily spoken by the people in Bima and Dompu Regency. Both of them are called Mbojo ethnic, an ethnic group which inhabits the eastern part of Sumbawa Island. Bimanese is generally classified as a member of Mongol Kaukasus (Austranesian) Language family.

Bimanese consists of four dialects, namely, Surasuba dialect, Kolo dialect, Wawo dialect, and Kore dialect. Most of the population use Serasuba dialect which consists of ten sub-lands, namely, Sape, Bolo, Madapangga, Tambora, Belo, Woha, Monta, Langgudu, Lambu, and Parado. Although, Bimanese has many dialects, the speakers still understand each other when they speak. For instance, people speaking Serasuba dialect understands people speaking Kore dialect or vice versa. A local language and culture is an important asset of the area. This is particularly essential to be continually developed so that the identity of the region can be preserved well. This language and culture is then, believed to inherit glorious values of ancestors to the youngsters.

Thus, it is of necessity to codify and invents it before disappearing. Going hand and hand with this disopinion, Bimanesse is a local language in Indonesia that need preserving. It is mandated by 1945 constitution (UUD 1945) of Republic of Indonesia. The explanation of the 36 articles states as follow: “Di daerah-daerah yang mempunyai bahasa sendiri yang dipelihara oleh rakyatnya dengan baik-baik, (misalnya bahasa Jawa, Sunda, Madura, dll). Bahasa-bahasa itu akan dihormati dan dipelihara juga oleh negara. Bahasa-bahasa itupun merupakan bagian dari kebudayaan Indonesia yang hidup (UUD 1945, P4, GBHN, 1993). (In areas where local language is well preserved such as Javanesse, Sundane, Madura, and the like, the locals are well respected and taken care of by the state as they are part of the existing culture of Indonesia).

Besides, the study of Bimanese another vernacular means to dig up the wealth of our nation to be actively participate in the development of our country, such as consciousness to strengthen of Indonesia in the future. On the basis of the above mentioned circumstance the writer thinks we need to make language description and prepare an appropriate instruction of it. This requires us, the linguistics in particular, to get invited in the inventory of the local language in Indonesia. But when we plan the native langue to be exist we should be faced the factor problem such as linguistic factor, the community of the own language, and culture.

Linguistic factors can be regarded as those that are needed to be considered on the part of a language in relation to other languages. It relates to the status and characters of a language as well as similarities between languages.

Another factor that has to be considered in language planning is the people. People who own languages of a particular territory should also be considered in language planning. If the argument that language is the people who use it is anything to operate by, then it will never fall out of scope to take an examination on the people who use the language to be planned for.

Cultural factor is another factor that can influence language planning. When a language exists, it does not exist alone, there is a culture attached to it. Culture refers to the beliefs, the ways of life, the custom, the art, and the social organization of a group of people. Learning the culture with which a particular language is attached is crucial to planning such a language especially in corpus planning.

Based on the classification above it clearly stated that vernacular language (Bima language) to be exist based on the four stages given by Haugen (1987) are depends on the people of Bimanese or Bima community to use or spoken of their language in their interaction in daily life. As a symbol of ethnic identity the vernacular language should be exist wherever the community itself continuously used of their language.