The fourth edition of CFAF (CRCS Friday Afternoon Forum) will be held on Friday, October 26, 2007, at 15:30-17:00, in Graduate School Building, third floor, room 306, Gadjah Mada University. The key speaker in the discussion will be Suhadi, M.A. The theme in the discussion will be ?Muslim-non-Muslim Marriage:An Indonesian Town Style?.
This discussion will present findings of a legal anthropology research on Muslim-non-Muslim marriage in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. At the first level, the issues are around survey about a number of Muslim-non-Muslim marriages in Yogyakarta, law of Muslim-non-Muslim marriage, and voices of ulama on Muslim-non-Muslim marriage. In the process of rigidifying Muslim-non-Muslim marriage law, the study develops on two other levels: (a) patterns of resistance among the ?local? ulama- the ummah toward the ?center? ulama/Islamic mass organization and; (b) patterns of resistance from Yogyakarta?s citizens toward state administrative regulations on inter-religious marriage prohibition. At this level, the presentation will show how people of the grass root level act against the state regulation by creating such kinds of administrative manipulations. As an ethnographic study, the research also will explore how the couples face challenges from the families, how they over come the problems raised by the civil-religious law, and how they educate religions to their children. The goal of this study is to look into the trends of religious freedom in Indonesia through the state regulation on inter-religious marriage and its practices in the society.