Singing the Memories: Songs about the 1965 Anti-communist Violence in Banyuwangi

Abstract: Within post-genocide societies and in the aftermath of mass killings, music functions beyond entertainment. It serves to reconcile, remember, and convey a message of peace or even criticize how authorities deal with the effects of atrocities. Music also functions to remember and preserve memory of violence, particularly in the context where violence is not part of the official narrative and historiography. By taking the case study of Indonesia's anticommunist violence in 1965, this article would like to analyze critically the perspective that perceive music as counter memory. Focusing on Banyuwangi, East Java, the area where intense violence against the communists and leftists took place, we study how locality affected the production of songs with 1965 themes. The historical construction of local identity, violence and stigmatization of local artists, all affected the choices to compose songs related to 1965. We argue that music about violence is not simply a counter narrative against the dominant memory, but a process of negotiation between locality and the national construction of the past.