BANYUWANGI CELEBRATION: HOW FESTIVAL CREATE PLACE-MAKING

Abstract

Banyuwangi is one of the developing cities in East Java where the festival program intensively hosted to promote tourism. Previously, the sense of festivity formed as an informal celebration where citizens independently hold an event to celebrate the national independence-day, religious feast, harvest time, circumcision, marriage, and other ceremonies. During the festival, the inhabitants enjoy cultural attraction by occupying street, alley, or open fields in their neighborhood area. Nowadays, in the urge to compete in the global market and boosted by social media, local government tends to reinforce cultural celebrations into a formal festival. Celebration which previously held randomly all over the neighborhood in the downtown area has been concentrated in the town square and main roads. This study aims to understand the changing meaning of festivity by analyzing the process of place-making in both informal and formal festivals. Considering its location, stage design, stakeholders, and experiences offered in cultural performance, we found that some aspects change the meaning of festivity. The informal festival hold in neighborhood area express the nuance of solidarity, artistic freedom, and religion in certain aspects. On the other side, formal festival seems to focus on promoting urban policy, local technology, economic outcome, and production of new city image.