Proverbs, a short well-known saying in figures of speech or symbolism, seem to have stood the test of ages for their usefulness in modern society. Proverbs have been found to serve people well as a significant rhetoric force in both oral and written communication, from friendly chats, powerful political speeches, and religious sermons to lyrical poetry, best-seller novels, and the influential mass media (Mieder, 2004). Proverbs reveal an awareness of the human condition and human flaws that make their distant voices ring with clarity, humor, wit, and insight (Barajaz, 2010). This paper reported a study of cultural values Indonesian proverbs associated with horse, buffalo, cow and donkey. The purpose is to identify how these animals are culturally perceived and used in transferring wisdom, acceptable and favourable manners and moral conducts. The data comprise 80 Indonesian proverbs using any of the four animals in their expressions, gathered from various printed and electronic sources. The study found that proverbs using these four animals are used to show both positive and negative human attitudes. Positively, they illustrate the values of self-motivation, hard-work and devotion to duty, truthfulness, dependability, well-adjustment, fairness and justice. Negatively, they exemplify foolishness, arrogance, hypocritical attitude, inherent wickedness, unfavorable attitude towards opposite sex, over-excitement and being in a dilemmatic situation. The study shows that such values have been orally taught and transferred within the context of familiar daily objects and situations in the chiefly agricultural cultures. The proverbs mainly function to convey advice on acceptable attitudes, manners, and moral conducts.
Keywords: figurative language, Indonesian proverbs, cultural values