Jawi Alphabet - Jawi Today

Jawi Today

“We should not discard or abandon the jawi script even though Malays are generally using the romanised script. This is because the jawi script belongs to us and is part of our heritage.”

— Pendeta Za’ba in the foreword of the book Panduan Membaca dan Menulis Jawi (1957)

Today, the script is used for religious and Malay cultural administration in Terengganu, Kelantan, Kedah, Perlis and Johor, as well as its influence in Sulu and Marawi in the Philippines. Various efforts were in place to revive the Jawi script in Malaysia and Brunei due to its important role in the Malay and Islamic spheres. Jawi scripts are also seen at the rear of Malaysian ringgit and Brunei dollar banknotes.The Malays in Pattani still use Jawi today for the same reasons.

Indonesia, looking back to its Javanese Majapahit roots, is less than enthusiastic with regards to the script. Mainly owed to the fact that Indonesia is predominantly Javanese. Nonetheless, the Jawi script does enjoy a regional status in Malay dominated areas in Indonesia such as Riau, Riau archipelago and Aceh. Today Jawi script is widely used in Riau and Riau Island province, where road signs and government buildings signs are written in this script. It is still widely used in traditional religious school across Java, however, in the form of Pegon script, a variant of it.