Alternate Names: Batavi, Batawi, Betawi Malay, Jakarta Malay, Melayu Betawi, Melayu Jakarte

Betawi Malay, also known as Jakartan Malay or Batavian Malay, is the spoken language of the Betawi people in Jakarta, Indonesia. It is the native language of perhaps 5 million people. The name Betawi stems from Batavia, the official name of Jakarta during the era of the Dutch East Indies.

Betawi is a Malay-based creole, and closely related to the Malay language (Bahasa Melayu? (zlm)). The Betawi language has large amounts of Hokkien Chinese, Arabic, Portuguese, and Dutch loanwords. Today Betawi Malay is a popular informal language in Indonesia and used as the base of Indonesian slang and commonly spoken in Jakarta TV soap operas.

Few written resources on Betawi are available on line. There are a number of You Tube videos available.

In the city of Jakarta, Betawi people work as traders, civil servants, laborers, craftsman, or employees of private companies. In areas surrounding Jakarta, such as Jagakarsa, Ciracas and Cilangkap, most Betawi people make a living by farming rice, growing fruit and fishing. Over time, much of the land they have used for rice farming has been sold to become sites for housing complexes, factories and other facilities required for modernization. As a result, many farmers have sought work in the city, becoming traders or tukang ojek (motorcycle taxi drivers).

The average level of education in the Betawi community is quite low. A possible reason for this is that the Betawi have identified schooling with the lifestyle of the ethnic Chinese or the colonial Dutch, causing them to reject education. This general resistance to schooling is strengthened by Islamic teachers who have urged the Betawi not to attend government-run schools, but instead to enroll in Islamic schools. The Betawi people are 98% Muslim and are extremely resistent to other religions. They do however embrace many of the spirit worship concepts of their ancestors.

544 of Indonesia’s 780 people groups do not have even Bible portions available in their primary language. The largest of these is the Betawi, 5,347,000.

Sources: Wikipedia
https://www.ethnologue.com/language/bew
https://joshuaproject.net/people_groups/10815/ID
https://www.faceofharvest.org/facts/