‘A CURSE OR A BLESSING?’: THE FATE OF IBAN WOMEN IN ‘ADAT NGUAI’ AS ILLUSTRATED BY LITERARY DEVICES IN IBAN SONG LYRICS
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Keywords:
Iban songs, gender, popular songs, cultural studies, content analysis.Abstract
Numerous studies have examined the depictions of men and women inIban songs. Such depictions revolve around the traditional roles of Iban men and women in both public and private domains. More studies, however, are needed to examine the nuances of these depictions, given the fact that many Iban popular songs portray gender in traditional Iban society. This paper aims to examine such nuances by exploring the fate of women in female Iban songs particularly on their rights and treatment by others as illustrated in the song lyrics. This study adopts the qualitative research design by using content analysis to analyze the description of Iban married women who decided to move out and live at their spouse home in two songs namely, ‘Tusah Belaki Nguai’ by Swaylin and ‘Tusah Nyadi Menantu’ by Linda Simai. The results show that the Iban women are 1) depicted as ‘nguai’ to her husband, who are submissive to the in laws and the husband, and 2) expected to display the quality of ‘indu tampun puji’ or ‘menantu ke dipilih’, that refers to the ideal concept of an Iban woman who is both hardworking and capable to manage the household.
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