Preserving Malang’s Local Wisdom through the WikiCarita Loka Project – Diff

What is WikiNgalam?

Malang, a city nestled in the highlands of East Java, is more than just a tourist destination, it is a living museum of history, myths, and traditions. Among the locals, the city is affectionately called “Ngalam”, a form of Boso Walikan (reversed language) that characterizes the community’s creative spirit. To capture this spirit digitally, KlubWiki Universitas Brawijaya, supported by Wikimedia Indonesia’s Dana Wiki, launched WikiNgalam, with WikiCarita Loka serving as its flagship project series.

WikiNgalam is the second project initiated by KlubWiki Universitas Brawijaya under the Dana Wiki grant. Completed within a focused timeline of approximately one month, this comprehensive initiative consists of three main activity series, with WikiCarita Loka being one of its core pillars. Two of these series focused on documenting local culture, while the third was dedicated to improving digital and information literacy.

Under this umbrella, WikiCarita Loka (derived from “Carita” meaning Story and “Loka” meaning Local/Place) was designed to be the storytelling heart of the initiative. Our goal was clear: to act as digital bridge-builders, empowering the community to document their surroundings and ensure the heartbeat of Malang’s culture is preserved for the world to see.

From Concept to Keyboard: Implementation

The implementation of WikiCarita Loka began with an in-depth archaeological visitation to four iconic temples in the Malang Raya area. On the first day, the core committee focused their documentation activities at Singosari Temple and Badut Temple. The journey then continued on the second day to explore the unique architecture of Jago Temple and Kidal Temple. All team members worked hard to record every piece of history, relief structure, and the remaining statues found at the sites. This documentation process is very crucial as an accurate information database for the development of local historical content.

After the field activities were completed, the series continued with an interactive WikiNgalam “Kopi Darat”. This collaborative event was attended by ten active members from the Universitas Brawijaya Wiki Club community with great enthusiasm. The participants successfully completed six new articles on the Wikivoyage platform focusing on regional historical tourism potential. In addition to text articles, they also managed to upload more than fifty high-quality documentary photos to Wikimedia Commons. This contribution significantly enriches the Ngalam-themed visual assets that can now be accessed by the general public worldwide at this category https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Wiki_Carita_Loka.

Kopdar WikiVoyage & WikiCommons

This main activity series was officially closed through a highly educational Wikibooks training session for literacy enthusiasts. The intensive training was attended by seven participants who have a great interest in systematic digital book compilation. The main focus of the activity was to provide an in depth understanding of collective writing techniques on the dynamic Wikibooks platform. Each participant contributed directly to compiling a work on the main page that represents the community’s dedication to free knowledge. The results of this collaborative work can now be accessed by the public through the https://id.wikibooks.org/wiki/Peninggalan_Sejarah_di_Wilayah_Malang_Raya 

WikiLatih WikiBooks

Project Impact in Numbers

While the WikiNgalam initiative is ongoing, the WikiCarita Loka series has already shown a significant boost in local content:

• New Articles Created: 7
• Articles Improved: 6
• Media Uploaded to Commons: 53
• Total Participants: 17
• Total Bytes Added: 52.759

Lessons Learned and Suggestions for the Future

Collaborating with local authorities is a crucial step for any community wishing to start a hyper-local documentation project. Active engagement with village officials or local historians opens access to various rare documents that are not available online. Deep insights from these community leaders provide a richer historical context for the narratives being developed. Through ongoing dialogue, the team can verify oral stories that have previously only been stored in the collective memory of residents. Good relations with the authorities also facilitate permits when conducting field expeditions to protected historical sites.

The strategy of prioritizing visual aspects proved very effective in attracting the interest of new editors within the Wikimedia ecosystem. Capturing and uploading photos to Wikimedia Commons often feels lighter and more enjoyable than composing long text articles. Strong visualization serves as a compelling entry point for readers to instantly understand the beauty of cultural heritage. High-quality photo documentation can also serve as very valid supporting evidence to strengthen the verifiability of information on Wikipedia. By starting with something simple like photography, the community can build the confidence of participants before moving on to more complex writing tasks.

What’s Next?

WikiCarita Loka is just one chapter of the WikiNgalam story. We hope this project inspires other university clubs in Indonesia and globally to look at their own local Loka. Every region has a story, and through Wikimedia, we can make sure those stories are told to the world in every language.

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