Djawa Baroe as a Rich Research Data Source: Focus on Literature Content

Abstract

Djawa Baroe magazine was published during the Japanese occupation of Indonesia from 1 January 1943 to 1 August 1945, with a total of 63 issues. This magazine contains various political, social, cultural, or economic articles, so it is a research source for various fields. Djawa Baroe does not specialize in literature magazines but has a lot of literature content. Therefore, this study aims to find data on the kind of literature content in Djawa Baroe. This study used a quantitative method to record all articles in 63 editions with literature content. The results show many literature genres in Djawa Baroe: short stories, plays, Lelucon or Indonesian comedy plays, poetries, paper theatres, comics, Kissah Sepanjang Jalan, or tsuji shousetsu in Japanese. All of these literature works were written not only by Indonesian authors but also by Japanese authors. There are also several essays written by Japanese writers. Djawa Baroe gives a clear picture of the Japanese military government's efforts to promote literature as a means of war propaganda at that time. It is not a literature magazine, but its large and varied literature contents make it a rich and interesting data source for literary research during the Japanese Occupation of Indonesia.