Javanese Language Guide: Where It's Spoken, Script, Grammar & Etiquette

Also spoken in: Indonesia, Suriname, New Caledonia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka
Script: Latin, Javanese

Where it's spoken

Most Javanese speakers live in Central Java and East Java. Indonesian is the official language of Indonesia; Javanese does not have official language status, but it is the most widely spoken regional language in Indonesia. Javanese is also spoken by immigrant communities in Suriname, Sri Lanka and New Caledonia.

There are three main dialects, corresponding to areas of Java: Central Javanese (including Semarang, Surakarta and Yogyakarta), Western Javanese (including Cirebon, Tegal and Banyumas) and Eastern Javanese (including Surabaya, Malang and Banyuwangi). They differ in pronunciation and vocabulary, but in general there is a high degree of mutual intelligibility. The standard dialect is based on Central Javanese as spoken in Surakarta and Yogyakarta, and it is representative of the Javanese taught in schools. This app's sign cards show the Indonesian wording, as in MASUK ("Entrance"), rather than Javanese.

Sources

Appen Butler Hill / Linguistic Data Consortium (2015). "Language Specific Peculiarities Document for Javanese as Spoken in Indonesia" (documentation for LDC2020S07, IARPA Babel Javanese Language Pack) — p. 1 (introduction); §1, "Special handling of dialects"
Alfina, Ika; Yuliawati, Arlisa; Tanaya, Dipta; Dinakaramani, Arawinda; Zeman, Daniel (2024). "A Gold Standard Dataset for Javanese Tokenization, POS Tagging, Morphological Feature Tagging, and Dependency Parsing." Forum for Linguistic Studies 6(5): 131–148 — §1 Introduction

Script & pronunciation

Javanese has traditionally been written in the Javanese script, but for practical purposes speakers nowadays rarely use it and use the Latin script instead. The Javanese script is used mainly by scholars or for decoration, and the Latin script is now the most commonly used writing system.

Indonesia's official spelling guide for Javanese in Latin letters lists six letter combinations that each stand for a consonant: dh, kh, ng, ny, sy and th. The letters dh and th stand for different consonants from d and t, as in Sekedhap ("Just a moment"), romanized Se-ke-dhap. The letter e is used for more than one vowel sound. For certain purposes, the spelling guide writes one e vowel as é and another as è; this app's cards almost always write e without these accents.

In the standard variety, a at the end of a word is generally pronounced [ɔ], and so is a in the syllable before it when the last syllable also ends in that sound. A paper on Javanese usage notes that writing o where a is correct is a common spelling error, for example writing lara ("sick") as loro, which is the word for "two", as in Wong loro ("Two people"). This app's romanization is the card's text divided into syllables with hyphens, as in Matur nuwun ("Thank you"), romanized Ma-tur nu-wun.

Sources

Appen Butler Hill / Linguistic Data Consortium (2015). "Language Specific Peculiarities Document for Javanese as Spoken in Indonesia" (documentation for LDC2020S07, IARPA Babel Javanese Language Pack) — §4; §7 (phone chart); §7.3 (vowel allophones)
Alfina, Ika; Yuliawati, Arlisa; Tanaya, Dipta; Dinakaramani, Arawinda; Zeman, Daniel (2024). "A Gold Standard Dataset for Javanese Tokenization, POS Tagging, Morphological Feature Tagging, and Dependency Parsing." Forum for Linguistic Studies 6(5): 131–148 — §1 Introduction
Balai Bahasa Yogyakarta (2011). Pedoman Umum Ejaan Bahasa Jawa Huruf Latin yang Disempurnakan. Kementerian Pendidikan Nasional — I. Pemakaian Huruf, B. Huruf Vokal and D. Gabungan Huruf Konsonan
Supana; Sumarlam; Suwanto, Yohanes (2025). "Aspects of the Javanese Language and Its Preservation." Proceeding of International Joint Conference on UNESA 3(1): 681–685 — Results

Grammar essentials

The default word order of Javanese is subject–verb–object: the subject normally comes before the verb, and the object follows it. The word for "not" is ora in ngoko and boten in krama; this app's cards also use the form mboten. In the card Kula mboten mangertos ("I don't understand"), the card's note breaks it down as kula ("I") + mboten ("not") + mangertos ("understand").

Ngoko and krama can also share a word but add different suffixes, such as ngoko -ne and krama -nipun. This app's card Matur nuwun kanggo perhatosanipun ("Thank you very much for your attention") ends in -ipun, which the card's note calls the krama possessive suffix. Pointing words also come in sets: this app's cards give niki ("this, near me"), niku ("that, near you") and nika ("that over there") as the polite everyday forms.

Sources

Alfina, Ika; Yuliawati, Arlisa; Tanaya, Dipta; Dinakaramani, Arawinda; Zeman, Daniel (2024). "A Gold Standard Dataset for Javanese Tokenization, POS Tagging, Morphological Feature Tagging, and Dependency Parsing." Forum for Linguistic Studies 6(5): 131–148 — §3.1; table of feature values (Polarity)
Universal Dependencies. "UD Javanese" language-specific documentation — Language-specific documentation: word order; PART (ora / boten)

Politeness & etiquette

Javanese has speech levels that are chosen according to the social relationship between the people talking. Ngoko is the informal level, used between people who know each other well, such as close family and friends. Madya is a semi-polite level used where status is unknown, for example between strangers. Krama is the polite level, used to show respect, for example by a child to a grandparent or an employee to an employer. Each level generally uses different vocabulary, and when a word has no krama form, the ngoko word is used.

Within krama there are special honorific words, krama inggil, which express respect towards the person being addressed. The word for "you" is kowe in ngoko, sampeyan in krama and panjenengan in krama inggil; "I" is aku in ngoko and kula in krama. This app gives Panjenengan ("You (respectful)") as the most respectful "you", and its card for Kula ("I / me") notes that aku is only for people you are close to. Yes and no also change: the cards give Inggih ("Yes") and Mboten ("No") as the polite forms. This app's card for Sirah ("Head") gives it as the ngoko word and notes that Javanese switches to a krama inggil word when speaking of an elder's head.

Younger people may understand both ngoko and krama but can only speak ngoko; these speakers typically use Indonesian with older relatives, where krama would otherwise be used, to avoid causing offence. This app's card Aja! ("Stop it! / Don't!") deliberately uses the blunt ngoko form for refusing pushy touts or unwanted contact.

Sources

Browse all TravelPhrases languages