Maritime Objects in Malay Pantun: An Inquisitive Semantic Analysis

Abstract

Malays are well known seafarers based on the historical evidence. The facts can be further strengthened through Malay ‘pantun’. Many lexicons pertaining Malay maritime such as waves, storm, raft, boat, ship, island has been captured in these pantun. The previous research on ‘pantun’ are limited to prescriptive studies and mostly focussing on flora and fauna. However, a study on specifically the lexicons of maritime is yet to be attended. This study aims to elaborate the meaning of ‘rakit’ (raft) and ‘kapal’ (ship) in pantun explicitly and implicitly and henceforth describe the mapping of these objects with the Malay mind. A total of 348 pantun concerning maritime has been extracted from the book, ‘Kurik Kundi Merah Saga’. The analysis is based on the ad-hoc concept and later finalised with inquisitive semantics. The finding shows that there is a clear mapping from the objects chosen in pantun with love. The raft that is a weak woven boat structure denotes the loose relationship in love meanwhile ships portrays a more resilience love relationship. Apparently there is a clear flow of relationship from the initial love (raft) followed by various challenges that finally becomes a strong ties in relationship (ship) and ended in marriage. The inquisitive semantics analysis proves that pantun are better understood beyond the cognitive level. More importantly, the positive impact given is that it enables us to discover the philosophy behind its creation.