Media Transformation and Environmental Communication Resilience in the Kajang Indigenous Community

Abstract

Background: Digital media increasingly reshape the communication environments in which Indigenous communities articulate ecological knowledge, creating opportunities for advocacy while exposing locally grounded meanings to algorithmic simplification and cultural commodification. For the Kajang Indigenous Community, these pressures are especially significant because Pasang ri Kajang links communication, identity, and environmental stewardship. Objective: This study analyzes how the Kajang Indigenous Community transforms environmental communication in virtual spaces while preserving narrative sovereignty and identity resilience. Methods: Using a qualitative interpretive design, the study combined participant observation, in-depth interviews with 12 purposively selected informants, and document analysis during three months of fieldwork in the Kajang customary area. Interview transcripts, field notes, and digital documents were organized in NVivo and analyzed through two coding cycles that combined deductive categories from Media Ecology Theory and symbolic resistance with inductively emerging themes. Credibility was strengthened through source triangulation and member checking. Results: The findings identify a hybrid communication pattern in which customary values operate as cognitive filters for digital engagement. Narrative sovereignty is sustained through place-based communication, selective cultural diplomacy, and symbolic resistance, while platform logics create risks of simplification, polarization, and commodification of environmental messages. Conclusion: Digital transformation does not necessarily erode Indigenous environmental communication. When Pasang ri Kajang remains the ethical framework for selecting, interpreting, and disseminating information, digital media can support ecological advocacy without displacing cultural authority or environmental meaning.