Title: Indonesian and Malay Students in Cairo in the 1920's
Abstract: Introducing the first issue of the third volume of the monthly Seruan Azhar (Call of Azhar) in October 1927, the then editor, Mahmud Junus, wrote that the journal Mis for our home land, because we recognize Indonesia and the Peninsula as one community, one people, with one adat, one way of life, and what is more, virtually one religion. . . .n Urging the two terri tories to unite for the common good of their peoples, he went on, ". . .With this fcall,T students at present in Egypt can associate themselves with their homeland while at the same time making known their ideas for the betterment of their people and their birthplace. . ..? fl Seruan Azhar had been started by Indonesian and Malay stu dents in Cairo in October 1925, as the journal of the DjamaTah al-Chairiah al-Talabijja al-Azhariah al-Djawiah, or Welfare Association of "Jawa" Students at the University of al-Azhar--"Jawa" in this context signifying, as it did throughout the Middle East, all Muslims indigenous to Southeast Asia.There had, of course, been Indonesian and Malay students in Cairo for many years prior to 1925, but it was apparently not until 1922 that they became sufficiently numerous, or sufficiently con scious of themselves as a group, to organize an association.Some time during that year the Djama'ah al-Chairiah was formed, with Djanan Thaib as first president.Djanan, from Minangkabau, had enrolled as a student at the University of al-Azhar in 1919, and later (in 1924) gained the distinction of being the first Indonesian or Malay student to graduate with the Alamiah degree.* 1 2 * The material on which this article is based was derived from the available written sources and from interviews conducted in Djakarta in November 1968, in Cairo in December 1965, and in Malaysia.For much helpful information and discussion, I wish to thank especially (while retaining responsibility for my own errors and opinions) Taufik Abdullah, of Cornell Uni versity, who is at present preparing a major study of modern Minangkabau social and intellectual history.1. Seruan Azhar, III, 25 (October 1927), p. 402 [sic for 486].2. On this last point, see ibid., I, 1 (October 1925), p. 1. Born at Sarik, near Bukittinggi, about 1891, Djanan went to Mecca in 1911 and then to Cairo in 1919.After active par ticipation in the affairs of the Djama'ah al-Chairiah and Seruan Azhar, of which he became first editor-in-chief (see