The research seeks to study forgiveness of the survivors of 14th-15th May 1998 riots in Solo.
Considering that the process to reach the willingness to forgive takes long process, the research is
eager to explore the process of reaching the choice of willing to forgive, and what steps, as some
theories had explained, should be followed, what factors encourage the survivors to prefer forgiveness
rather than resentment. It will identify various factors, such as religious teachings and cultural values
which influence the survivors in coping with the violent past. On other way, for the survivors who
fail to attain the spirit of forgiveness, what factors which block them.
It uses Critical Discourse Analysis of Norman Fairclough. Fairclough considered three stages
of CDA. The first, description, concerns on text with all its properties. The second, interpretation,
concerns on the production and interpretation of text or the relationship between text and interaction.
In this regard, it will focus on intertextuality and interdiscursivity. It refers to how the survivors
presented their social experience using other texts and discourses as their references. The third,
explanation, concerns on the relationship between interaction and social context or the influence of
social context to the production and interpretation of text.
Answering the first research question, there are four types of response of the survivors. Those
four types are: (1) no need forgiving, (2) forgiving (3) not forgiving, and (4) forgetting. Most
survivors use “surrender to God as the survival strategy.” It was manifested in textual features such
as words, idioms, and other textual grammars such as takdir, kehendak Tuhan, rencana Tuhan,
berpasrah diri, nrima, ya sudah etc.
Since forgiveness is the important path to attain national reconciliation, hopefully this
research can give contribution to the national reconciliation of Indonesia which had some dark history
regarding violence in the past.