Shall We Dance? Defining Sexuality and Controlling the Body in Contemporary Indonesia
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Although some parts of the article are interesting, it sins of an essentialist approach in the treatment of some key-issues, such as Islam, sexuality, Islamic conservatism that are presented as obscure and monolithic realities. This problem weakens the scientific validity of the article which needs more research and in-depth characterization.
Author Response
Thank you for your review and comment. Please see my response in the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
This is an excellent article addressing several critical issues. The depiction of Indonesia is accurate, sensitive and balanced. I knew Gus Dur and remember him raging against the Arabization of Indonesia
Author Response
Thank you for your review and comment.
Reviewer 3 Report
The article deals with the articulation of conservative Islamic norms related to gender issues and sexuality against the background of the recent political history in Indonesia. The way how this recent political history is sketched might need some refinement. In the first place there has always been the so-called electoral paradox in Indonesia, which means that although the majority of the population is Muslim, the total number of votes did not go to Muslim parties (cf. lines 45 ff.) (see also remark on lines 214 ff.).
I think it is not productive to place the Islamic movement versus democratisation (lines 85 ff.), because most Muslims support democratisation. Perhaps this is a slip of the pen, and instead of Islamic Islamist movement is meant.
I understand why the MUI is mentioned as a conservative organisation (lines 124 ff.), but I think it is not right to place them on the same line as the other organisations mentioned there, because the MUI does not have an active radical agenda as the other organisations mentioned have. Related to this is the characterisation of Ma’ruf Amin (lines 176 ff.) as a proponent of the anti-Ahok movement. I think his role as MUI chairperson was more complicated.
Lines 214 ff. states that under Suharto Islam was suppressed, but this was absolutely not the case. What was suppressed were political expressions of Islam, while from the 1980-s onwards cultural Islam became more and more important (as footnote 7 hits at). From this period onwards we also see a rise in the wearing of hijab (cf. line 220).
In section 4.1 the general Islamic rules related to sexuality are given on the basis of the work of the Moroccan sociologist Abdessalam Dialby. I wonder if there isn’t a source available for this which is closer to the situation in Indonesia (perhaps the Kompilasi Hukum Islam and/or other sources).
The implications of the stricter conservative adherence to Islamic law as mentioned in the conclusions are rather obvious, and therefore do not offer much new to the specialist. Sometimes it is also added that this might be harmful to tourism.
As a final note I want to mention that I find the title of the article rather bombastic, but his might be a matter of taste.
Author Response
Thank you for your review and comment. Please see my response in the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
