ABSTRACT
This article aims to demonstrate the cenrality of the human subject in the karawitan lyrics of Ki Narto Sabdo. It describes how Ki Narto Sabdo presents landscape and considers whether his work contains a socio-political or ethical agenda. Most importantly, it examines the human relationship to space, how humans interact with the environment, and potential sources of conflict in this interaction. The article concludes that the creative texts of Ki Narto Sabdo can be positioned as a defense against the unequal power relations that lead to the loss of self-identity, cultural alienation, and the uprooting of cultural tradition, history, and national character. Ki Narto Sabdo’s creative texts are responses to efforts to de-colonize culture by reviving or re-establishing cultural meaning and identity in and through the imaginative world.
