The dialectic of public/private sphere in Betawi’s waqf mosques

The urbanization and gentrification in Jakarta causes many limitations for the Muslim Betawi or the descendants of the people who inhabited Batavia, the colonial name of Jakarta. However, one of their legacies continuously persisted in the urban landscape of Jakarta in form of waqf mosques and mushollas (small mosque). The shifting process from private property to public property in the waqf tradition has left traces of Betawi way of life and its expression in the spatial dimension. This study attempts to understand the concept of public/private from the perspective of the Betawi people using mini ethnographic method. The analyses of the study were based on the constructivism paradigm. The study revealed the emergence of new dialectical relation between the public and private sphere during the transfer process of ownership in waqf.