Revealing the Kafoa Language Vitality through the Basic Cultural Vocabulary Mastery: Implications for Language Education

Abstrak

The Kafoa language is one of the indigenous languages in Indonesia so that needs to preserve it to be in existed category and reveal it as language assets in Indonesia and local culture identity. Revealing the Kafoa Language vitality can be conducted through many perspectives, one of them is through the use of basic cultural vocabulary mastery by native speakers. Therefore, this study aimed to reveal the Kafoa language vitality through the basic cultural vocabulary mastery by the speakers in Bawah Sub-Village, Probur Utara Village, Southwest Alor District, Alor Regency, East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. The study was a qualitative applying case study method. Data were the answer of 40 speakers of the Kafoa language as respondents. In collecting data, questionnaire and interview guidance were used as instruments involving 451 basic cultural vocabularies in nine domains of body parts; pronouns, greetings, and references; kinship; village and community life; house and its parts; equipment and tools; foods and beverages; plants and trees; and animals. The data were then analysed through Miles and Huberman steps of data analysis. The study result showed that 190 (42%) vocabularies are still mastered by the speakers of Kafoa language, while 261(58%) vocabularies are not longer mastered. It indicates that the tendency to master the basic cultural vocabulary by speakers of the Kafoa language tends to decrease thus its vitality is getting low. To maintain the vitality or life power of the Kafoa language, a policy from the Government is needed and teaching it in the schools is considered.