Elements of Creative Thinking of the Malay Society Through Selected Written and Oral Literary Texts

Abstract

Creative thinking is marked by the ability to see something from multiple perspectives. The traditional society has long been practising creative thinking in their survival for life. The traditional life of the society, with the sources from nature acting as the background, has taught them how to live and practice values and norms based on their experiences and natural sources that are found around them. The creative thinking of the Malays, which is conveyed via oral and written traditions, should be expanded to the present generation to build their characters and manners, as well as encouraging them to think using creative thinking by looking at the context of the society that produced the literary tradition. This paper has two objectives, where the first is identifying the elements of creative thinking that are found in taboos, proverbs and Sejarah Melayu, and the second objective is to elaborate the role of creative thinking in forming student’s character. This paper also looks at the three techniques of creative thinking from the analogy technique or figure of speech, where the first one is the analogy of nature, the second is personal analogy and the third is fantasy analogy. For example, the use of fantasy analogy’s technique of creative thinking, where the creativity of the Malays in the Sejarah Melayu texts can be seen, where there is an episode of a king called Raja Suran, who went to the sea-bed in a glass case or called as a craft. Traditional Malay literatures like taboos, proverbs and Sejarah Melayu texts are seen to be able to form the character of students through the elements of creative thinking found in them. The Malays are very well known with their expertise in expressing their thoughts subtly and implicitly.