CHALLENGES IN THE USE OF STANDARD INDONESIAN IN ACADEMIC LANGUAGE IN FORMAL FORUMS

Objective: This study identifies these challenges, examines their contributing factors, compares descriptive compliance across five types of academic forums, and proposes practical responses. Method: A qualitative descriptive design was used, combining a focused review of authoritative linguistic and sociolinguistic literature with a structured secondary analysis of the forum-level observations contained in the source manuscript. The five forum profiles were coded according to four dimensions: standard diction and terminology, grammatical effectiveness, register appropriateness, and spelling or presentation accuracy. Results: The descriptive results show that academic seminars had the highest reported compliance (90%), whereas thesis examinations, proposal seminars, research workshops, and classroom academic discussions each recorded 75%. The qualitative synthesis identified four recurrent forms of deviation and five interrelated causal factors: habitual language use, limited practice-based instruction, multilingual transfer, globalization, and language attitudes. Because the percentages are derived from a limited descriptive record, they should be interpreted as exploratory patterns rather than population estimates. Novelty: The findings indicate that prepared speech tends to support closer conformity to standard norms than spontaneous interaction. Sustainable improvement therefore requires integrated instruction, repeated performance-based training, institutional language review, accessible Indonesian terminology resources, and consistent modeling by academics and public officials.