Webinar Series NADIM: Middle Class Construction in Rolling Stone Indonesia Magazine
Who determines which social class we belong to in society? The answers could vary. One of those who determine our social class is a music magazine. Music magazines define that our taste in music indicates where our class level is in society. People who like dangdut and pop music belong to lower class tastes, while rock, pop, and jazz are middle class tastes.
These things were revealed by Kavca Diosaputra from the results of his research in the music magazine Rolingstone Indonesia (RSI). The final year student of Communication Studies UII presented it in a series of Webinar series episode 16 organized by the Center for Alternative Media Studies and Documentation (PSDMA) NADIM Communication Studies at the Islamic University of Indonesia on Friday, April 16, 2021.
Diosaputra, who is often called Dio, collected archives for a span of 12 years from 2005 to 2017. In the magazine archives he found that the discourse that appeared most often was concerts. Good news, concert reviews, preparations, stories on stage, riots, and so on.
From the articles about concerts in RSI magazine, Dio drew some main ideas about what concerts are. Concerts and music are tools of upper middle class politics. Here, the concert is a place to escape from the daily routine as a leisure time. Daily routines mean routines between home, family, and work in the office. Which means it is a formal job, not an outdoor job such as a tradesman, driver, or other outdoor work which is often called an informal job.
“The dominant concepts discussed in Rolling Stone Indonesia magazine tend to talk about the interests of the upper class”
-Kavca Diosaputra-
In defining the middle class apart from concerts and certain types of music, it is also shown through news. For example, articles about dangdut music and stage performances. Dangdut concerts are always identified with riots and drunkenness. In addition, the diction used always uses the words ‘people’ and ‘people’s tastes’. The word ‘people’ is always identified with the small community or wong cilik.
Apart from the choice of words, the myth of the middle class in RSI magazine is also seen from the writing portion and puts the subject of authority (eg government) as the main source of news, not spectators or traders, cleaners, etc.
Further evidence is related to the topics of articles carried in the RSI magazine. “The dominant concepts discussed in RSI tend to talk about the interests of the upper class,” Dio wrote in one of his presentation slides.
“For example, talk about music tourism. This seems to put big business ahead of the lower class economy.” From what was discussed, it can be seen where RSI is positioning partiality and discourse on certain classes.
