SEASS lecture: Who wants to be the Tinderella?

Narrative construction of online dating practice in Indonesia

Public SEASS lecture by Rinatania Fajriani, PhD fellow at the Dept. of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies

Nowadays, the use of online dating application has changed the romantic relationship practice. The Location Based Real Time Dating (LBRTD), in particular, has been used to find a sex partner, but that does not necessarily apply in Indonesia. As the biggest Moslem populous country, Indonesia has certain norms and rules that forbid man and woman to display intimacy in public. In some province, such Aceh and West Java, the act of intimacy includes the togetherness of unmarried man and woman riding motorbike, holding hands, hugging, and kissing. Indeed, a lot of people use the online dating application for finding romantic relationship partner, and some people use the application as a platform to channel their desire. However, as I did my virtual ethnography, I found some people using their wedding photo as a LBRTD profile picture. I have also found a profile that uses the application to sell pineapple jam, along with the Multi Level Marketing (MLM) and insurance agents offering their product. So this provokes a question, how do the Indonesian youth and adolescent perceive the idea of online dating? And to that end, how do they conceive the narrative of LBRTD?

Rina Fajriani
PhD student at University of Copenhagen. LPDP scholar, received MSc from the University of Manchester. Founder of Mata Garuda, co-founder of Kado Untuk Anak Indonesia and Gemanesia.com

Word of welcome by:
Bisuk Abraham Sisungkunon Gultom (Chairman of The Indonesian Students’ Association (PPI - Perhimpunan Pelajar Indonesia) in Denmark