Good morning everybody,

The honorable judges, teachers and all my beloved friends.

How are you this morning?

I hope today all of you have good mood and condition too.

First of all, I would like to thank to the Almighty God who has been giving us blessing and
mercies so we can attend this English speech contest in good condition.

Before I start my speech, let me introduce myself. I am Pauline Kezia Napitu. I am from junior
high school of Methodist II Tanjung Balai. I am in the second grade of junior high school.

In this opportunity I would like to deliver my speech entitled “The Students’ Role in Preserving
Our Culture”. The reason why I talk about this topic is because I want to show you the
importance of preserving traditional culture for students. As we know that Indonesia has so many
traditional cultures but students right now don’t want to know or use them in their daily life, I
would liker to poke students’ awareness about the traditional culture, because they are affected
with western or Korean culture and to ask all of us especially students to preserve traditional
culture because students now or “Kids Zaman Now” prefer Western culture or Korean culture,
like K-Pop and Modern Dance.

The outline of my speech is:

1. What is Culture?

2. Why students prefer western or Korean culture?

3. How students can preserve our traditional culture?

First, I will explain about the meaning of culture. Do you know the meaning of culture? Culture
means life style which grows in the society area which is passed on generations. Such as music,
language, traditional dances, cuisine, and etc. As we know, Indonesia is a big nation, has
abundant natural resources and has more than 17 thousand islands, and each island has its own
culture. Based on Central Bureau of Statistics or Badan Pusat Statistik, we have 7.241 cultures in
Indonesia; we have more than 1.340 tribes and 742 languages. Culture is an identity. Many
people know Indonesia because of its various cultures. Bali is famous not only because of its
beautiful panorama but also strong cultures, such as Kecak dance and Temples. Because of that
many people come to visit Bali every year. Even, western singer, Audun Kvitland sings “Nasi
Padang”. He said, he made the song because he likes the taste of Nasi Padang when he tried it at
the first time so he makes the song. We also have Batik, Keris, Wayang, Rendang, Tor-Tor and
Borobudur and many more. We as the students should know and feel proud because we have
various famous cultures in Indonesia. But unfortunately, students now live in a globalization era.
They don’t have any interest in their own culture. They prefer modern culture that comes from
Western or Korea.

Ladies and Gentleman

Do you know Blackpink, BTS and Taki Taki? They are so famous right now. I think many
students know and love their songs, dances or even languages. Do you know that in my class
almost all students talk about Korean Drama and K-Pop every day? And they can sing the song
fast and they also can practice the dances easily. And because of this globalization era too, the
student nowadays have a mind set about “International Standard” anything they do is all about
western and Korean thing. They behave in a western and Korean style; they like break dance,
R&B, hip hop, Korean dance and song more than their own songs and dances. And also, students
nowadays use internet and social media such as YouTube, Twitter or Instagram to see and post
about the western or Korean culture like modern dance, Korean drama, Mobile Legend and etc.
The western or Korean cultures are famous because. They are stylish, fashionable, cool and
trendy. Now, Indonesian students love modern and Korean music and dance and they forget
Indonesian traditional music and dance, little by little. They don’t want to learn traditional or
sing traditional dance because they think those are not trendy, right?

So, ladies and gentlemen I’m standing here to tell you all, how important culture awareness are.
Why do I say that? Because if not us, the students, the young generation that takes care our
culture, then who else will? Do we want our culture to extinct? Of course, not. We don’t want to
let that thing happen, right? So what we can do to preserve our culture?
First is being proud to be Indonesian. We don’t have to be shy to be part of it. We should be
proud because we have so many traditional cultures. We can do simple thing to show that we are
proud to of having traditional culture. For example, we can wear Batik or Kebaya, we eat
Rendang or Nasi padang, we don’t need to eat pizza, hamburger or steak all the time, we can
play Petak Umpet, Kelereng or Lompat Tali. As we know it, students now like to play Mobile
Legend, Pokemon and PUBG. They like to play with their gadgets and do outdoors activity. We
can also attract other people to know about it and join it.

Second is to make the students and young generations nowadays love our cultures. We have to
make them realize that our music and dance and other culture are also great and not old-
fashioned. We can sing traditional songs and practice traditional dances in performing arts in our
each school. We don’t need to dance Korean dances or sing western songs all the time. We also
can modernize our dances and songs so students like and interested with them. We also can mix
it with another culture to make it more fun.

And the last and the most important thing we have to educate and inform the youngsters about
Indonesian culture. We as the students should educate and inform our friends, brothers and
sisters about the various cultures in Indonesia, we have to tell to our brother or sister to play
traditional games, to sing traditional songs, to eat traditional food, to dance traditional dances
and to wear traditional clothes of Indonesia from now on so it will be their habit and they will
love and preserve the tradition. We should care for our culture.

The conclusion of my speech is, first, we have to know the culture of our country. Second, we
cannot be spoiled with the western or Korean culture. Though, modern culture comes to our
country, we should not forget our culture. Third, we have to preserve our culture by being proud
to be Indonesian, to make the students and young generations nowadays love our culture and we
have to educate and inform them about Indonesian culture.

I think that’s all about my speech. Thank you very much for your good attention, and I’m sorry if
there are some wrong words I’ve said. So let us love our culture, preserve it, grow it and of
course be proud of Indonesian Culture! "If we save the culture, it means we also save the
Nation and Our country". Thank you.