Situated Testimonies: Dread and Enchantment in an Indonesian Literary Archive

Glossary

Glossary Terms in this glossary appear in bold when they are first used in the text. For Malay and Indonesian words, older spellings are given first and then new spellings. actief kiesrecht: Dutch for “active suffrage.” affect: As used in psychoanalytical studies, “affect” (G Affekt) goes back to Freud’s early work, where he saw affect as an excess of excitation or a “quantity of instinctual energy” that an individual could not release (see Laplanche and Pontalis, The Language of Psychoanalysis, 13–15). In a vast oversimplification, the affect becomes attached, at least temporarily, to a memory but is not accessible except possibly by Freud’s own “talk therapy.” Freud modified his own definition several times over the course of his career. Today “affect” is used more generally in psychoanalysis to represent emotional energy with, for example, anxiety as one mode. Usually “affect” is a more general term than “emotion,” and one affect can encompass several emotional states. afterwardsness: Jean Laplanche’s translation of Freud’s idea of Nachträglichkeit. agencyless subjects: People perceived to be without the power to act. anchoring point: F point de capiton, or “upholstery button,” from Jacques Lacan, who sees the button as holding ideologies in place to keep secrets and meaning concealed. angst: Dutch, German, Danish, and Norwegian word for a mixture of terror, fright, and anxiety. antimimetic model of trauma: Theory of trauma where the trauma is believed to be completely external to the subject. aporias: Sources of hesitation or doubt. Balai Poestaka: Malay word for the Dutch colonial publishing house, or Bureau of Popular Literature (D Commissie voor de Volkslectuur), in the Indies in the early decades of the twentieth century. Balai Poestaka Malay: The form of Malay preferred by the Dutch colonials and their Native assistants who worked at the Balai Poestaka. beschaving: Dutch word for “culture” or “refinement.” blijvers: Those Dutch colonials and planters who lived in the Indies for long periods of time and adopted Native ways. buaja/buaya: Malay word for mixed-blood scoundrels or, literally, crocodiles. Bupati: Javanese word for Regent, the highest Native official in the Indies. Cakrabirawa or Bhairawa Cakra: Oral tradition preserved in temple inscriptions that confers occult power on the person able to read the teaching 276 Glossary and master it. Cakrabirawa also refers to Indonesian president Soekarno’s elite military guard in the early 1960s. cathartic method: Breuer’s and Freud’s late-nineteenth-century idea of having patients talk about their thoughts, wishes, dreams, and phantasies, often under hypnosis. colonial modernity: The time period of European imperial rule in Holland and the Indies as used in this book. creole: Word for full-blooded Europeans born outside of Europe. danjang/danyang: Javanese word for guardian spirits of trees, streams, and so on. declarative memory: One of the theorizations of memory that refers to memories that can be narrativized. It is often opposed to procedural and/or traumatic memories. desubjectivized form: In a dream, a subject scattered throughout the setting. dewa-dewi: Malay and Indonesian word for gods. dhalang/dalang: Javanese and Indonesian word for puppeteer, or one who manipulates things behind the scenes. documentary desires: The desire to preserve something through historical, literary, and/or mediatic methods. dosa: Indonesian word for sin. dream-work: Freud’s theory of dream interpretation based on ideas of condensation, displacement, secondary revision, and considerations of representability. dukun: Javanese, Malay, and Indonesian word for shaman. elmoe: Couperus’ Dutch spelling for ilmu, the Malay and Indonesian word for magic forces or science; from the Arabic ‘ilm ‫ع‬. enigmatic signifiers: Term Jean Laplanche borrowed from Jacques Lacan for messages implanted in children by family members and other caregivers. family romance/family narrative: Freudian idea of children’s unconscious or conscious desires for different and better parents. une fantasmatique: French word for “phantasmatic.” See entry for “phantasmatic.” focalization: Theoretical concept from Dutch scholar Mieke Bal for analyzing perspective, point of view, and relations between figures in narrative. Gerwani: Women’s political group in 1950s and early-1960s postcolonial Indonesia associated with the Indonesian Communist Party. The Gerwani women were accused of lewd dancing and mutilation of the bodies of the captured generals on the night of September 30, 1965, as part of the so-called Untung coup that was blamed on the Communists. Haagsche (Haagse) romans: Novels of colonial era Den Haag. Louis Couperus’ most famous novels are his Haagsche novels. Glossary 277 hadji/haji: Islamic man who has...