Revisiting the May 1998 riots in Indonesia: civilians and their untold memories

Abstract

This paper examines the recollections of civilians about the May 1998 riots in Indonesia, as told in an anonymous online survey. These riots caused the deaths of an estimated 1000 people and saw targeted attacks on Indonesia's ethnic Chinese community, including state-led mass sexual violence against Chinese-Indonesian women and girls. Despite their scale, there has never been any official redress for these riots and they remain a taboo topic in Indonesia, rarely discussed publicly. Little is known about how Indonesians remember these events, with research into the personal or collective memories about the riots challenging, given the public silencing by the government. Here, we present findings from an anonymous survey completed by 235 Indonesians in which they revealed sometimes deeply personal memories about the riots. Examined thematically, these memories both confirm general understandings of the riots and reveal novel information about how communities coped during the violence.