Glocal Da'wah: Negotiating the Banyumasan Local Dialect in the Transnational Digital Da'wah Space (A Case Study of Rri Purwokerto)

This study examines the phenomenon of “Glocal Da’wah” through the negotiation of the Banyumasan local dialect within the transnational digital space of RRI Purwokerto. The research is grounded in the shift of da’wah media from terrestrial-auditory broadcasting toward visual-digital platforms that dissolve conventional geographical boundaries. The central problem addressed is the tension between the prevailing assumption that digital da’wah must rely on standardized formal language to achieve universality, and empirical evidence showing that the “Ngapak” local dialect instead functions as a significant pull factor for transnational (diaspora) audiences. Theoretically, this research employs Roland Robertson’s framework of glocalization to dissect the dialectic between the universal and the particular, complemented by Stuart Hall’s and Zygmunt Bauman’s theories of cultural identity to analyze the negotiation of subject positions in cyberspace. A qualitative descriptive case-study method was applied to the Mutiara Pagi program of RRI Purwokerto. Primary data were obtained through in-depth interviews with preachers, program producers, and audience members, supported by observation of audience interaction on the YouTube and TikTok channels. The findings reveal three key results. First, the Banyumasan dialect functions as a medium of “digital home-coming” that triggers diasporic collective memory amid the fragmentation of postmodern society. Second, preachers’ communication strategies demonstrate a “particularization of universalism,” whereby the universal religious message is adapted into a local linguistic frame to make it more accessible. Third, digital platforms facilitate a “universalization of particularism,” in which local identity is projected onto the global stage through new-media algorithms. The study concludes that digitalization does not extinguish locality but instead amplifies it into global symbolic capital through a “Digital Ngapak” model that provides an identity anchor for a transnational moral community.

Glocal Da’wah; Banyumasan Dialect; Transnationalism; RRI Purwokerto; Cultural Identity

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