Ethno-psychology of ambyar: The representation of relative deprivation and emotional coping in Javanese pop song lyrics
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.26555/bs.v46i2.2169Keywords:
Emotional Coping , Indigenous Psychology , Javanese Pop, Mental Health , Relative DeprivationAbstract
This study examines how psychological experience is represented in contemporary Javanese pop song lyrics amid socio-economic inequality. The phenomenon of "ambyar" is read here not merely as an expression of romantic loss, but as reconstructed in these lyrics as an emotional response to social inequality. This study analyzes the representation of relative deprivation, self-esteem threat, and culturally embedded emotional coping in the Javanese pop songs Ropang, Yowis, Titenono, and Ginio. Qualitative content analysis based on indigenous psychology will be used in this paper to analyze the representation of relative deprivation, self-esteem threat, and culturally rooted emotion-coping. The findings show that the representation of emotional experience takes place using social comparison, internalized economic identity, and culturally rooted coping strategy such as sambat and nrimo coping strategy as well as assertive way of response. All findings are treated as textual representations rather than as evidence of the actual psychological states of songwriters, performers, or audiences. This study proposes the Ethno-Psychology of Ambyar as an interpretive framework, inductively developed from these four songs, for understanding the construction of psychological experience in Javanese pop music; its generalizability and empirical validity remain open to further testing.
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