Courtesy of Cahyati Press
Independent publishing might seem like a small element of Indonesia’s cultural landscape: limited print runs, niche books, and audiences that rarely extend into the mainstream. Yet these spaces can matter precisely because they make room for voices, ideas, and forms of cultural expression that have little place elsewhere.
This matters in Indonesia today, where civic space is increasingly constrained and marginalised communities, including queer people, face growing stigma, scapegoating, and political hostility. In this context, publishing becomes not only about circulating books but a way of sustaining communities and creating spaces where people can think, disagree, and imagine different forms of social and political relations.
In this week’s episode, Dr Clara Siagian speaks with Syarafina Vidyadhana, co-founder and commissioning editor of Cahyati Press, an independent publishing practice based in Bali. Cahyati publishes books, zines, and artist books by writers, poets, artists, and researchers, particularly queer, working-class, and BIPOC voices that are often overlooked by mainstream publishing.
Syarafina reflects on her twelve-year journey through independent publishing and on why Cahyati Press came into being. For her, independent publishing is less about size than editorial freedom to publish work because it matters, even when it defies common literary classification or when it is not commercially viable.
That freedom takes on particular significance when we talk about queer publishing. As LGBTQ+ people in Indonesia face increasing stigma and political scapegoating, Syarafina argues for the importance of documenting queer lives in all their complexity. This means communicating not only stories of violence and survival, but also stories of friendship, family, work, migration, desire, boredom and joy. Publishing, in this sense, can be a quiet form of resistance which encompasses preserving stories, creating memory, and allowing people to recognise that they are not alone.
The conversation also takes us beyond Indonesia. Cahyati Press is part of a growing international network of independent publishers, artists, writers, booksellers and cultural organisers across Southeast Asia, Australia, Europe and beyond. Rather than seeing Indonesia simply as a place where international researchers and artists come to study or work, this network points to Indonesia as a place from which connections are being forged, and cultural conversations are being shaped.
Finally, we discuss what independent publishing might offer academics: an opportunity to experiment with shapes, audiences and methods, and to imagine forms of knowledge production beyond the rigid conventions of academic publishing.
In 2026, the Talking Indonesia podcast is co-hosted by Dr Clara Siagian from the University of College London, Dr Jacqui Baker from Murdoch University, Dr Elisabeth Kramer from the University of New South Wales, Tito Ambyo from RMIT, and Dr Jemma Purdey from the Australia-Indonesia Centre.
