FBS Language and Arts Month Festival Becomes Event to Strengthen Cooperation and "Cultural Diplomacy"

Unesa.ac.id. SURABAYA–The Sawunggaling Building at Surabaya State University (UNESA) reverberated with the excitement of stunning artistic performances at the peak of the Language and Arts Month Festival, Faculty of Languages ​​and Arts (FBS), Tuesday, October 8 2024.

Activities involving The BEM faculty and HMP study program around FBS carries the theme "Harmony in Literacy, Uniting Differences Through Language and Art." This agenda is a celebration of the richness of Indonesian language and arts.

This festival consists of several series starting with a cultural parade showcasing the specialties of various FBS departments and continuing with art performances in the evening.

Rizki Ramadhan, chairman of the committee, explained that this series of Language and Arts Month Festivals was held to increase student creativity, especially FBS UNESA students.

"So that in the future we will be able to further improve our creativity, our innovation and our collaboration together and bringing the name of Unesa to become more successful and developed in the national and international fields," he said.

BEM Advisors FBS, Arif Hidajad, said, this agenda is a forum for communication or as a place of communication for the FBS community to let go of any primordial things by communicating through language, artistic symbols so that they can get to know each other.

"Difference is wealth and mutual respect is a matter of pride and the hope is that this activity can be internationalized," he said.

This festival was opened symbolically, namely the beating of the gong by the Deputy Dean 1 of FBS, Didik Nurhadi and the beating of the gamelan by Herry Rizal from the Sultan Idris Education University ( UPSI) Malaysia.

In his speech, Didik Nurhadi explained that this activity was a form of appreciation for FBS students and as a forum for improving skills.

Apart from that, the vision of this activity is to be able to collaborate with Sultan Idris Education University Malaysia and as a form of appreciation for BIPA students to learn culture and will be displayed later.

Apart from that, Herry Rizal from UPSI Malaysia has also designed several collaborative activities both in the form of art and collaboration in form of student exchange and lecture exchange.

"We hope that future cooperation can be followed up with mutual agreements and mutual benefits obtained by both parties," he said.

Events that held for 3 months, it was also enlivened by all FBS students, BIPA (Indonesian Language for Foreign Speakers) students, and Malaysian students as festival participants.

The Language and Arts Month Festival also featured performances from various study programs those at FBS UNESA and UPSI Malaysia. There was a drama by BIPA students, a campursari performance from the Javanese Language and Literature Education study program, a keroncong music performance by the Sendratasik study program.

Then, there was a Mandarin dance performance by the Mandarin Language Study Program, a guitar performance by the Music Study Program, as well as performances from other countries. Jiran by Band David All Star & Amir Jahari.

One of the performers from Malaysia and also a participant in the Language and Arts Month Festival, Kay, expressed his pleasure at being able to be involved in this activity. "I like being at UNESa, everyone is friendly and kind," he said.

Miwa, who is a BIPA UNESA student from Japan, also expressed her happiness. He admitted that he enjoyed watching Ponorogo's reog, cultural parades and performances of keroncong and campursari music.

“I really enjoyed the art performances here, I was also interested in learning about Indonesian culture. "I also like traditional music performances combined with modern music, such as drums and guitar," he said.[]

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Reporter: Dewanda (FBS) and Retno Nurus Solekhah ( Fisipol)

Editor: @zam*

Photo: Language and Arts Month Festival Committee