HISTORY
Established in 1954, Universitas Airlangga intially had five faculties, including Faculty of Letters that was located in Denpasar, Bali. Several years later in 1962, the faculty declared separation from Universitas Airlangga Surabaya. However, the determination of having Faculty of Letters in Universitas Airlangga was still strong among some academicians. Dr. Ma’rifin Husin, dr., M.A., who at that time was Vice Rector IV Universitas Airlangga, asked Maartini Biran, Dra. to clear the way to realize the goals. The establishment of Language Laboratory in 1975 became the forerunner that aimed to manage English teaching for Universitas Airlangga’s students. The next step was among others completing hardware and software, as well as Language Laboratory.
Efforts on establishing Faculty of Letters originally began from the basic thinking that national culture was an intellectual repertory that needed to be preserved and developed to maintain national identity. Humanities were also disciplines that were closely related to transformation and application of science and technology. Faculty of Letters was expected to become one of national cultural development hubs in Indonesia.
Establishment Plan of Faculty of Letters was for the first time included in Development Master Plan (RIP) year 1980-1990. This plan was followed by solid actions, among others:
- Recruitment of English Language and Literature lecturers from several universities outside Universitas Airlangga commencing in 1981. While waiting for the Faculty of Letter’s establishment, lecturers were placed at Faculty of Social and Political Science (FISIP).
- Formation of Faculty of Letters Establishment Assessment Committee, resulting in the proposal of opening two study programs in Directorate General of Higher Education, namely English Literature and Indonesian Literature, taking location in FISIP.
- Study Program of Indonesian Language and Literature and Study Program of English Language and Literature were officially established on November 13th 1989.
- Study Program of History was opened, with March 13th, 1998 as the official date of establishment.
With God Almighty’s grace and hard work performed by academic personnel of the three study programs under the guidance of Dra. Siti Parwati Sumarto Danusugondho, M.Ed. who served as Chief of Language and Literature Department at that time and under the last committee of Faculty of Letters Establishment chaired by Sudijah Soeratno, Dra., M.A., the Faculty of Letters was finally established in 1998, more accurately on December 2nd 1998 based on the Decree of Minister of Education Number: 290/O/1998.
In order to provide medium-level professional needs in the sector of the service industry, public administration, and English education and teaching field, Faculty of Letters opened Study Program of English Language Diploma III (D3) in academic year of 2000/2001 upon the Decree of Higher Education number: 3105/D/T/2001 dated September 26th 2001 on Permit of English Language Diploma-III Study Program at Universitas Airlangga.
Further, the faculty’s willingness of becoming a great, independence, and growing faculty had underlain the forming of Committee of Japanese Literature Study Program Establishment in 2000. In 2006, Faculty of Letters Universitas Airlangga was permitted to open the Undergraduate Study Program of Japanese Literature.
With regards to the development of the study of Literature and History that led to cultural studies and the high number of students using Cultural Studies as their bachelor thesis theme along with the core of Literary and Historical studies that tended to be literary and cultural studies, Faculty of Letters then changed its name into the Faculty of Humanities (FIB) Universitas Airlangga BHMN (State-Owned Legal Entities) under the Decree of Rector No. 3292/J03/OT/2008 dated April 10th 2008. The change on the faculty’s name aimed to facilitate, extend, and develop the multi-disciplined study in humanities. The change was also made in line with the development of Universitas Airlangga BHMN, namely of two superior disciplines: health science and social-humanities science.
In 2010, in accordance with Decree of Rector of Universitas Airlangga number: 08/H3/KR/2010 dated January 14th, 2010, Master’s Program of Literary and Cultural Studies of Faculty of Humanities Universitas Airlangga was set up. This study program will put literary studies in the context of vastness-growing culture in the borders and convergence of institutionalized multiple discourse, particularly in literature, sociology, and history; as well as in linguistics, semiotics, anthropology, and psychoanalysis. As part of the results, and part of political and intellectual upheaval in the 1960s (marked by rapid development and the spread of structuralism, semiotics, Marxism, and feminism), cultural studies entered a period of intensive theoretical development. It aims to learn how culture (social production of meaning and consciousness) can be explained in itself and in its relation with economy (production) and politics (social relation). Later in 2013, Master’s Program of Linguistics of Faculty of Humanities Universitas Airlangga was also founded.
All of the study programs have acquired accreditation (English Literature, History, Master’s of Literary and Cultural Studies are accredited A; Indonesian Literature and Japanese Literature are accredited B; and Master’s Program of Linguistics on accreditation proposal). Aside from that, Faculty of Humanities since its earliest has been integrated with AIMS (Airlangga Integrated Management) program that participates in external accreditation by Bereau Veritas with the standards of ISO 9001:2008, IWA (International Workshop Agreement) 2:2007, and also MBNQA (Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award). In 2012, it earned the final score of 616.5 (Emerging Industry Leader).
Since the Faculty’s founding, the names of Deans from the first year (1999) until today (2016) are in the following:
- Prof. Wahjoedi, S.H.,C.N., period of 1999-2003 (Faculty of Letters)
- Drs.Heru Supriyadi, period of 2003 – 2007 (Faculty of Letters)
- Drs.Aribowo, M.S., period of 2007-2010 and 2010-2015 (Faculty of Humanities)
- Diah Ariani Arimbi, Ph.D, period of 2015-2020 (Faculty of Humanities)
- Prof. Dr. Purnawan Basundoro, S.S., M.Hum, period of 2020 – now (Faculty of Humanities)