Bazaar Malay Research Articles

Chineseness in Sino-Malay printing: a triptych of self-criticism

ABSTRACT From late-colonial times, Chinese-Indonesian writers began formulating competing notions of belonging and diasporic identity. Two political ideologies coexisted. The first and oldest was rooted in the ideals of the 1911 Revolution and encouraged the Indies Chinese to devote themselves to the “fatherland.” This movement attempted to resinicise those culturally hybrid Peranakan families in particular. The second group perceived the Indonesian archipelago as its home and advocated for more integration into the Indies society, often in solidarity with Indigenous people. The resulting tensions manifested themselves on the pages of vernacular publications. This article juxtaposes journalism, fiction and poetry as mutually reinforcing platforms to articulate, problematise and debate Chineseness. These genres and the slightly different messages they produced reveal evolving worldviews and a lack of consensus as key Indies Chinese experiences. Periodicals started exhibiting a greater diversity of opinions by the 1930s. A similar tendency is seen in novels and short stories in which pro-China and pro-Indies factions were often criticised in roughly equal measure. These fictionalised debates offer valuable insights into society’s faults and fissures. Fiction is relevant as it grappled with otherwise elusive social taboos, such as romantic encounters between different communities. Lastly, poetry was the genre par excellence to express frustration, aided by the rhetorical devices of sarcasm and translingual creativity. Across these genres, language proves crucial to understanding society’s conflicting expressions of Chineseness. While most of the discourse took place in vernacular Malay, acculturation through profuse borrowing from Hokkien helped to forge a discourse of identification and belonging.

The ages of pragmatic particles in Colloquial Singapore English

Abstract The study aims to work towards a diachronic reconstruction of pragmatic particles in Colloquial Singapore English (CSE, also known as “Singlish”) by exploiting an unused historical data source: The Oral History Interviews held by the National Archives of Singapore (OHI-NAS). We investigate the distribution of five pragmatic particles (ah, lah, leh, lor, and meh) in 101 interviews conducted between 1979 and 2009 in speakers born between 1899 and 1983. Lim (2007) reconstructs the origin of these particles in different substrate languages, with the first two particles (ah and lah) being traceable to earlier Bazaar Malay and/or Hokkien, while the latter three (leh, lor, and meh) are of later Cantonese origin. The results of the present study show that ah and lah are the most frequent particles attested earliest. Their frequency of use increases over time, being additionally contingent on the gender and age of the speakers, their educational level, and their ethnic background. The particles ah and lah are mostly used in assertive contexts.

Cosmopolitan Sounds and Intimate Narratives in P. Ramlee’s Film Music

ABSTRACTThis article illustrates historically, how the cosmopolitan aesthetics of Malay musical practices operated in tandem with the cultural intimacies of vernacular Malay film narratives to express the complex interconnectivities of a fluidly linked and diverse region. The film music icon, P. Ramlee, employed a cosmopolitan approach to making music; merging Anglo-American jazz and Latin American rhythms with regional Malay and Javanese folk music, themes and cultural references. When screened, heard and reproduced in contemporary contexts, such films and music illicit nostalgia for an idealistic era during which the nation was in-the-making. A narrative of pity for P. Ramlee is affectively instrumentalised by the Malaysian state, local cultural producers and multinational corporations; recalling his image and works to appeal to the Malaysian public. An analysis of the film music in Ali Baba Bujang Lapok (1961) directed by P. Ramlee unravels the threads of cosmopolitan musical practices and culturally intimate expressions that challenge the rigid boundaries of the nation-state; expressing a unique inter-regional, multilinguistic and multiethnic collective identity. This paper argues for a conceptual approach that examines the cosmopolitan intimacies of cultural production; revealing the complex cultural, political, national and transnational constestations and connections of a postcolonial Malay world.

Filling gaps or code choice? Code-switching across generations in colloquial Singapore Mandarin

AbstractSingapore is a multiracial, multicultural island nation; three quarters of its population is ethnic Chinese. This paper examines the phenomenon of code-switching between the younger generation and their parents, and grandparents, focusing on the English, Chinese dialect and Malay elements present in this variety of spoken Mandarin. The data is taken from university students who have recorded their conversations with their parents, grandparents, siblings and friends. Many of the older generation in their 70s still speak southern Chinese dialects such as Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese, Hakka, and Hainanese as well as Bazaar Malay (which was alingua francawith Hokkien). Their spoken Mandarin consists of code-switching with these dialects. The middle generation in their 50s is the generation that is able to communicate both with the older generation and younger generation in the various languages. Their spoken Mandarin consists of English, dialects, and even some Malay. The younger generation in their 20s can hardly understand or speak these dialects as a result of the Speak Mandarin Campaign which was launched in 1979 to replace all dialects with Mandarin. As such, the younger generation’s spoken Mandarin consists mainly of English code-switched elements. This paper argues that code-switching takes place mainly due to convenience to fill in the gaps when younger speakers do not know the Mandarin equivalent of the words in certain domains, given the changes in language policies in the nation. In this case, it is not necessarily a choice of code but rather filling the gaps with the language that they know out of necessity.

Chinese vendors’ code-switching in service encounters in Sarawak, Malaysia

The study examined the language of service encounters in a bakery operated by Chinese vendors in a Foochow-dominant town in Malaysia. Naturally occurring data of 100 service encounters were digitally recorded (83 with Chinese customers and 17 with non-Chinese customers). In intraethnic interactions, Foochow is the default language choice but Mandarin is emerging as a viable option. In interethnic interactions, the Chinese vendors accommodated by speaking either Bahasa Malaysia or Bazaar Malay. A majority of the service encounters took place in one language as code-switching was identified in only 19 encounters. In interethnic interactions, the vendors switched to thank customers in English but in intraethnic interactions, the functions vary with the staging of service encounters. The main functions are emphasis on attributes of goods in Sale Enquiry, attributes and quantity of goods to buy in Sale Request, and attributes, quantity and price of goods to sell in Sale Compliance. Code-switching in the Purchase Closure stage brings in expression of thanks which is not an integral feature of service encounters in Eastern settings. Using stages of service encounters to explain code-switching functions provides a less context-dependent framework which shows how code-switching brings about efficiency in service encounters.

Wh-Questions in Colloquial Singapore English

This paper discusses supplementary roles played by Bazaar Malay and Baba Malay in the genesis of wh-questions in Colloquial Singapore English (CSE). CSE has three options for wh-questions: (a) full wh-movement, (b) partial wh-movement, and (c) wh-in-situ, just like Bazaar Malay and Baba Malay. Whereas options (a) and (c) arose under pressure from English and Chinese, option (b) apparently challenges the Sinitic substrate hypothesis on CSE for two reasons. Firstly, neither Cantonese nor Hokkien possesses partial wh-movement. Secondly, it is mysterious how the apparent Malayic pattern could have entered the pool of CSE features within the predominantly Sinitic contact environment. This paper proposes that partial wh-movement was added onto the CSE grammar as an evolutionary ‘adaptive’ trait from Malay which survived selective Sinitic pressures due to congruence between Malay and Chinese. Both Cantonese and Hokkien possess a wh-topicalization structure, which is sufficiently similar to the partial structure in Malay. As a result, the former served as the template for Chinese speakers to analyze the latter as a congruence structure in the emerging variety. This result supports the recent view that typological congruence between Sinitic and Malay must be taken into account in any discussion of the origin/development of CSE grammar.

Modernization of the Vernacular Malay House In Kampong Bharu, Kuala Lumpur

Kampong Baharu (KB), literally meaning "New Village", is located in central Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It came into existence in 1899 as a reserved area only for ethnic Malays. Over time, urban growth resulted in the settlement losing its agricultural value and now it is a unique preserved housing area for Malays. Many vernacular Malay houses that were built in the 1900s still exist in KB. These houses were not original vernacular houses and were transformed and modernized into unique typologies that lie between the traditional and modern typologies.This study defines these houses as 'modern' vernacular Malay houses and attempts to explore the typologies of such houses built during the 1900s in KB. More than 100 vernacular Malay houses in KB were investigated and analyzed with respect to three major elements of order of the traditional Malay house elevation: roof, wall and pillar. As a result of this study, several representative 'modern' vernacular typologies were proposed. It is important to document these typologies because they demonstrate how traditional vernacular Malay houses were transformed into modern houses through the modernization process.

Chinese meets Malay meets English: origins of Singaporean English word-final high tone

This article investigates the origins of the word-final high tone in Chinese speakers’ Colloquial Singaporean English (CSE). Uniquely among Chinese Englishes, high tone is not attracted to stress, but to word-final position, e.g., hiˈ biscus [LˈMH]. Since this tonal pattern has no convincing match in Singapore’s major Chinese varieties, the author proposes that its ultimate source is indigenous Malay speakers’ phrase-final intonational rise. New recordings provide evidence for transfer via the formerly widespread Malay-based pidgin known as Bazaar Malay, reinforced by the Baba Malay creole of earlier Chinese settlers as well as Indian English. This proposed path of transmission from indigenous Malay > Bazaar Malay > Chinese CSE begs two questions: why did transfer occur from a non-native language, and why did the final high boundary tone become more frequent with each transfer? The author discusses these issues in the light of findings from SLA, third language acquisition, and creole studies, which show that the emergence of this highly marked feature was in fact favoured by a number of known constraints on transfer. Thus CSE tone provides not only a test case for rigorous investigation within a highly multilingual context, but also appears to constitute the first documented case of L2 to L3 prosodic transfer.

Impact of language planning on language choice in friendship and transaction domains in Sarawak, Malaysia

This paper shows that language planning in government-controlled domains has a spill-over effect in domains where language use is not regulated by language policies. Language planning in post-colonial Malaysia can be broadly divided into three phases: status planning whereby English was replaced by Bahasa Malaysia as the official language; remission in status planning whereby English was allowed restricted status as the medium of instruction for science and mathematics; and reinforced status planning for Bahasa Malaysia as a tool for unity. By ensuring that Malaysians are proficient in Bahasa Malaysia, the government has engendered the voluntary use of Bahasa Malaysia and its varieties for inter-ethnic communication in the friendship and transaction domains. There is a gradation in language use from the lower to the upper end of the transaction domain for inter-ethnic communication as follows: Bazaar Malay in the market, Sarawak Malay in shops, and Bahasa Malaysia in hotels. The role of English as a language for inter-ethnic communication is gradually being supplanted by Bahasa Malaysia, leaving English to function in domains such as law, the private sector, and higher education. The prominence of these two languages in the national and international arena, respectively, reduces the priority given to ethnic languages in friendship and transactional domains.

Bazaar Malay topics

Bazaar Malay is a Malay-lexified pidgin with a Chinese substratum spoken in the marketplace of Singapore (and elsewhere in Southeast Asia). Although it is no longer a lingua franca in Singapore today, it is nevertheless still spoken by older Singaporeans. Like Chinese and Malay, Bazaar Malay is a topic-prominent language. We document three types of the Bazaar Malay topic construction and show that they are identical to the topic structures found in Chinese. The degree of convergence in the topic construction between Chinese and Bazaar Malay, and between Chinese and Singapore English, supports the systemic view of substratum transfer.

Popular cultural cringe: language as signifier of authenticity and quality in the Singaporean popular music market

AbstractThis article looks at the popular music industry in Singapore and argues that there exists a ‘cultural cringe’ for domestic English-language music, which is considered as inferior to English-language music from Western countries. Singaporean consumers of popular music use the English language as a signifier of authenticity and consequently quality of musicians. Local musicians are deemed ‘inauthentic’ because consumers perceive the local variant of English spoken in Singapore is inferior to other variants of English spoken in Western countries. There is thus an underlying sub-text of an inferiority complex coming out of the post-colonial experience that effectively diminishes the possibility of success as English-language musicians. Yet, such a phenomenon is not observed in the vernacular Malay and Chinese-language music industries. In the final analysis, this article suggests that modernisation and modernity for Singapore is neither completely localised nor completely imposed: there exists a negotiation in the popular cultural sphere based on historical (colonial) baggage.

Mergers and acquisitions: on the ages and origins of Singapore English particles1

ABSTRACT: This paper presents a comprehensive account of the discourse particles in colloquial Singapore English (SE), considering their etymology in the light of both structure and sociohistory. While the object of many studies, mostly focusing on their meaning and use, and generally recognised as coming from Southern Chinese languages, the establishment of the origins and evolution of SE particles has not before been attempted. The thrust of this paper is thus twofold: (i) it outlines the linguistic ecology of Singapore over the decades and proposes a framework involving three ages in which different languages are recognised as dominant, influencing the feature pool in the evolution of SE, and (ii) it identifies the most likely sources of SE particles, through (a) a systematic comparison of the forms and functions of SE particles with particles from the substrates, including, in particular, their original tone, and (b) recourse to sociohistorical facts to support the linguistic postulation. I suggest that in an early era Bazaar Malay and Hokkien contributed the particleslah,ahandwhat, and Cantonese in a later age providedlor,hor,leh,mehandma, inclusive of tone. This argument highlights issues interesting for contact dynamics and new varieties of English.

The relevance of Salako for Proto-Malayic and for Old Malay epigraphy

Salako is spoken in the Lundu district of Sarawak's First Division and in three discontinuous areas in Kabupaten Sambas in West Kalimantan, Indonesia. Despite the persistent belief of some scholars that Salako is a Land Dayak isolect, it belongs to the Malayic-Dayak linguistic subgroup, as Hudson (1970) already pointed out, and is closely related to Kendayan and Belangin (both spoken in Kabupaten Pontianak). These three dialects are mutually intelligible, and I call them West Malayic Dayak to distin guish them from Iban, Mualang and other Ibanic isolects of the Malayic Dayak subgroup, which are spoken east of the Land Dayak linguistic area (see map 42 in Wurm and Hattori 1981-3). I use Hudson's term 'isolect' as it is connotationally neutral with respect to the distinction between language and dialect (cf. Hudson 1967). A phonological outline of Salako has appeared earlier (Adelaar 1991). Malayic Dayak isolects are important for the history of the Malayic linguistic subgroup, as they have developed in relative isolation from other Malayic isolects. They have undergone to a much smaller degree the long standing and intensive influence from lingua franca varieties of Malay such as Standard Malay and Bazaar Malay, which have also brought with them considerable lexical influence from Indian languages, Javanese, Arabic, Persian and European languages. West Malayic Dayak is of particular interest for the linguistic history of the Malayic subgroup, as on

Discontinuous Reduplication in Vernacular Malay

Proceedings of the Fifteenth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (1989), pp. 193-202

The sound system of Melaju Sini: Malay as spoken by younger Moluccans in the Netherlands

1. As is generally known, the term 'Malay' is used for a wide range of linguistic varieties (Steinhauer 1980, 1987, forthcoming; de Vries 1980): it covers structurally distinct standardized varieties (Indonesian, Malaysian), dialects and dialect chains (along the east coast of Sumatra, the coastal areas of Borneo and in the Malay peninsula), and, finally, a number of pidginized varieties (such as Bazaar Malay) and 'cre?les'. The latter arose in urbanized centres where people from different linguistic backgrounds met and settled. These people presumably used a reduced form of Malay as their common means of communication, which subse quently became the mother tongue of the next generations, again devel oping into a fully fledged language. One such creole arose in Ambon town some 400 years ago (cf. Steinhauer forthcoming).2 This Ambonese Malay (henceforth AM) is only distantly related to the many Austronesian local vernaculars which are still spoken in most of the villages throughout the Moluccas (cf. Blust 1978; Collins 1983, 1985; Ekris 1864-65; Ho?vell 1876, 1877; Stresemann 1927). In many villages of the Ambon-Lease archipelago (which comprises the islands of Ambon, Saparua, Nusa Laut and Haruku) the use of these so-called