Faculty of Cultural Sciences UGM and Alumni Association of Universitas Gadjah Mada (KAGAMA) will organise a competition for arts and literature, themed revitalisation of awards towards differences.
Categories of competitions include poem writing, short story writing, literary criticism, photography, meme writing, short film making and profile making of Faculty of Cultural Sciences UGM. It is open to the public and will present awards worth hundreds of millions. The participants, however, have to upload their works first on social media. The deadline is 30 September and the announcement will be made on 9 November during the Night of Literary and Arts Awards at PKKH UGM. More information can be seen at www.fib.ugm.ac.id.
Competition chairman, Dr. Aprinus Salam, said literary and arts competition had been initiated to be held annually in 2012, but it did not run in the past two years. Now, collaborating with Kagama, the competition resumes. Participants in the past included big names in literature and arts. Aprinus Salam said with the support from Kagama, the competition would be able to present bigger prizes. “The first winner in each category will be awarded as much as Rp10 million in prize,” said Aprinus to journalists on Friday (18/8) in the Margono Room of the Faculty.
Secretary General of Kagama, Dr. Ari Dwipayana, said the reason for Kagama to support the competition was to encourage UGM’s reputation in arts and literature. "We want UGM not only to be known not just for its engineering, law, social or political sciences only, but also its writers and artists that have national and international reputation," he said,
UGM Vice-Rector for Cooperation and Alumni, Dr Paripurna, appreciates the competition, saying the event would encourage writers and artists to produce better works. “We believe that in the future the tradition can enliven the passion for arts of the writers and artists,” he said.
Dean of Faculty of Cultural Sciences, Dr Wening Udasmoro, the literary and arts awards this time raised the theme of multicuturalism, culturalism and revitalisation of differences that emphasised the importance to respect differences. This was taken, according to the Dean, due to the concerns over language degradation phenomenon in social media interaction that is seen in the degraded use of language ethics. "In our virtual space, there is some sort of language degradation, so we want to encourage everyone to use good language, one of this is done through literary works,” she said.