Assessment Of The Readiness Level of Japanese-Speaking Muslim Students from Malaysian Higher Education Institutions to Perform Da’wah

Da’wah is defined to be the act of propagating Islam. Anyone who wishes to perform this act in Japan needs to be able to speak Japanese and be ready to carry out Da’wah activities. Unfortunately, information on Da’wah readiness is hardly found despite work readiness being studied in many fields, using the Work Readiness Scale. Thus, this study looks at how Muslim Japanese-speaking tertiary learners in Malaysian Higher Educational Institutions perceive their own readiness to perform Da’wah. A questionnaire on five attributes of readiness to perform Da’wah namely, Islamic knowledge, persuasive communication skills, cultural awareness, media skill literacy and motivation, was distributed to tertiary learners who learn and can speak the Japanese language. 150 responses were obtained, and a descriptive analysis was done to identify the perceived level of Da’wah readiness of the respondents. The findings reveal that the respondents generally perceived themselves to have low readiness to perform Da’wah. A more structured effort such as training and workshops to strengthen the five attributes, therefore, is needed in preparing Japanese-speaking Daies to perform Da’wah in Japan.