Singapore English Research Articles

“But you don’t sound Malay!”

Abstract This study examined the English accents of English-Malay bilinguals in Singapore to ascertain whether language dominance was a determinant of accent variation in Singapore English, with a hypothesis that a Malay-dominant bilingual would have more ethnic-specific features than an English-dominant one. Ten English-Malay bilinguals – five English-dominant and five Malay-dominant – who differed greatly in their language dominance took part in this study. In an ethnic discriminability task that involved 60 naïve raters, Malay-dominant bilinguals were significantly more often correctly identified as ethnically Malay and were rated as having a significantly more perceivable Malay-accented English accent, while those who were English-dominant had an English accent that lacked ethnic-specific features so much so that naïve raters, including raters who were English-Malay bilinguals, were less able to identify the speakers as ethnically Malay. The results of this study indicate that early sequential bilinguals or simultaneous bilinguals of the same two languages need not have similar accents. The findings also suggest that language dominance is a determinant of accent variation in Singapore English, at least for the English-Malay bilinguals.

Cross-dialectal Awareness and Use of the Bath-Trap Distinction in Singapore: Investigating the Effects of Overseas Travel and Media Consumption

Lay observers and linguists have claimed that ongoing phonological and lexical changes in Singapore English may be attributed to increased exposure to American English via media consumption (Poedjosoedarmo 2000; Deterding 2007; Leow 2011). Little is known, however, regarding Singaporeans’ explicit knowledge of the dialect features of other regions, and how this knowledge is shaped by social and parasocial contact. The present study investigates a well-known difference among regional English dialects: the realization of vowels in the bath and trap lexical sets. 1167 Singaporeans are surveyed regarding their own pronunciation of bath and trap words, as well as their perceptions of how these words are pronounced in California and London. While Singaporeans are found to generally retain a conservative bath-trap distinction, media consumption and travel experience, as well as gender and education level, have significant impacts on reported use. Explicit knowledge of the US bath-trap merger is found to be poor relative to the high US media consumption rate, illustrating the limits of media as a source of sociolinguistic knowledge. Contrasting sharply with the rise of postvocalic rhoticity, reluctance to adopt the bath-trap merger is argued to stem from both functional and ideological factors; conservatism in this feature complicates proposals of a wholesale Americanization of Singapore English.

Development of the Inpatient Dignity Scale Through Studies in Japan, Singapore, and the United Kingdom

PurposeThe importance of human dignity in care is well-recognized. Care recipients' experiences with undignified care have been reported in many countries. However, few studies have measured these situations quantitatively, especially as there are no tools applicable to inpatients receiving ordinary daily care. This study aimed to develop a valid and reliable Inpatient Dignity Scale (IPDS) that can measure inpatients' expectations of and satisfaction with dignity in daily care. MethodsWe conducted a three-phase research project: item generation and a preliminary survey with 47 items related to patients' dignity in Japan, a main survey with 36 items with deliberate translation into English in Singapore, and a confirmatory survey with 35 items in England, with 442, 430, and 500 inpatients as participants in questionnaire surveys, respectively. Data from each survey were processed using factor analysis. ResultsAuthors obtained a scale with a four-factor structure with acceptable reliability: (F1) respect as a human being, (F2) respect for personal feelings and time, (F3) respect for privacy, and (F4) respect for autonomy. ConclusionThe Inpatient Dignity Scale can be periodically used by hospital administrators or nurses to preserve inpatients' dignity in daily care by monitoring inpatients' views regarding their expectations of and satisfaction with dignity.

Effect of dialect on phonological analysis

ABSTRACTIt is important to understand a child’s language background, to ensure appropriate assessment, diagnosis and treatment of speech sound disorders. Singapore is home to various cultures and languages, and local speech norms are needed to provide an accurate reference for assessing phonological disorders in the local population. This study aims to establish normative data and better understand the English phonological development of English–Mandarin bilingual preschoolers in Singapore, aged 3; 6–4; 5 years. The Articulation and Phonology subtests of the Diagnostic Evaluation of Articulation and Phonology – UK were used to collect speech data from 146 preschoolers. Responses were scored against two standards – British Standard English (BSE) and Singapore English (SGE), in terms of speech sound accuracy, and the frequency and type of error patterns present. The effect of language dominance on the children’s English phonological abilities was explored. Results showed that the preschoolers’ speech sound accuracy increased significantly when scored against SGE versus BSE targets. The number of children identified to be using several error patterns was reduced when SGE targets were used instead of BSE targets. English-dominant children scored significantly higher than their Mandarin-dominant peers on measures of speech sound accuracy. The identification of error patterns also differed between the two groups. These results show that it is important to take dialectal variation and language dominance into account in assessment, to determine if speech characteristics are due to a speech sound disorder or just normal dialectal variations.

Listener judgments of speaker and speech traits of varieties of Asian English

ABSTRACTThis study examines language attitudes towards different varieties of English through listener judgments of speaker and speech traits; in addition, the study explores the relationship of these judgments to the intelligibility, as well as the perceived accentedness and comprehensibility, of varieties of Asian English and General American English. While a great deal of research has examined the intelligibility, accentedness, and comprehensibility of English, including varieties of Asian English, no research to date has examined the relationship between language attitudes and the aforementioned dimensions of Asian English speech. That is, little is known about how listeners’ judgments regarding speaker and speech traits relate to intelligibility, as well as how such judgments relate to the way in which the listener evaluates the accentedness and comprehensibility of the speaker's speech. The current study addresses these issues through an examination of listener reactions to three varieties of Asian English (Hong Kong English, Singapore English, and China English), as well as American English.

Debra Ziegeler and Bao Zhiming, eds Negation and Contact: With Special Focus on Singapore English

This article reviews Negation and Contact: With Special Focus on Singapore English EUR 95.00978-9-02725-948-6

Mapping out particle placement in Englishes around the world: A study in comparative sociolinguistic analysis

AbstractThis study explores variability in particle placement across nine varieties of English around the globe, utilizing data from the International Corpus of English and the Global Corpus of Web-based English. We introduce a quantitative approach for comparative sociolinguistics that integrates linguistic distance metrics and predictive modeling, and use these methods to examine the development of regional patterns in grammatical constraints on particle placement in World Englishes. We find a high degree of uniformity among the conditioning factors influencing particle placement in native varieties (e.g., British, Canadian, and New Zealand English), while English as a second language varieties (e.g., Indian and Singaporean English) exhibit a high degree of dissimilarity with the native varieties and with each other. We attribute the greater heterogeneity among second language varieties to the interaction between general L2 acquisition processes and the varying sociolinguistic contexts of the individual regions. We argue that the similarities in constraint effects represent compelling evidence for the existence of a shared variable grammar and variation among grammatical systems is more appropriately analyzed and interpreted as a continuum rather than multiple distinct grammars.

Final devoicing in Singapore English

This study investigates the voicing contrast in word-final obstruents in Singapore English. Previous auditory accounts have suggested that word-final obstruents undergo complete devoicing in Singapore English and become identical to their voiceless counterparts, including neutralization of differences in adjacent vowel duration (among others, Bao 1998, Wee 2008). On the basis of acoustic data from the NIESCEA corpus (Low 2015), we examine the extent to which voicing-related differences are neutralized when reading wordlists, sentences and passages as well as in unscripted conversations. Results suggest that neutralization is phonetically incomplete in Singapore English, with underlying voicing being recoverable from such parameters as closure voicing ratio and durations of consonants and adjacent vowels. These findings are in line with the results for other devoicing languages, such as German and Russian, that also show incomplete neutralization of the voicing contrast in final obstruents (e.g., Roettger et al. 2014, Kharlamov 2014).

Coupling tonetics and perceptual attunement: The psychophysics of lexical tone contrast salience

As with the coupling phonetics and psycholinguistics by such luminaries as Sereno and Jongman, we couple (a) discrepant cross-lab results in infant lexical tone perceptual attunement studies and (b) an adult cross-language lexical tone perception study. Three trajectories of lexical tone perception over infants’ first year have been found over labs, in which infants from differing language backgrounds have been tested with differing stimulus materials, viz., (i) Incremental (Singh’s lab—Singaporean Mandarin vs Singaporean English language background infants, Singaporean Mandarin tone contrasts; Tsao’s lab-Taiwanese and English language infants, Taiwanese Mandarin contrasts); (ii) Decremental (Burnham’s lab—Australian English but not for Cantonese or Mandarin language infants, Thai contrasts; Yeung/Werker’s lab—American English but not for Mandarin and Cantonese language infants, Cantonese contrasts); and (iii) U-shaped (Kager’s lab—Dutch infants, Mainland Mandarin contrasts). To investigate these discrepancies, we tested discrimination of Singaporean Mandarin, Beijing Mandarin, Hong Kong Cantonese, and Bangkok Thai tone contrasts by Singaporean Mandarin, Beijing Mandarin, Hong Kong Cantonese, Bangkok Thai, and Sydney Australian English listeners. Despite some discrepancies, this coupling revealed some congruences between psychophysical level of difficulty of tone contrasts within and between languages in the adult study, and the different developmental trajectories in the infant studies.

"How many c(R)s do you have?"

Singapore English (SgE) is, thus far, not known to be a rhotic variety of English, having its roots in standard British English (BrE). However, recent studies have shown evidence of rhoticity in SgE, and this has been attributed to the widespread influence of the American media, especially on local youth. This study questions the factors affecting rhoticity among young, female Singaporeans. It looks at rhoticity in SgE by considering speakers who have attended a particular group of schools with a strong tradition of English language proficiency. Rhoticity is investigated through a reading task and a Diapix task, and it is found that within this group a small number of individuals do exhibit some limited rhoticity, but that most of them seem to prefer a more local speech style. The use of rhoticity and American English (AmE) evidenced here is nonetheless interesting, perhaps taking on a more specific function in this group—one of achieving particular conversational goals and of establishing commonality among a group who share an affinity with American culture.

A social network approach to particles in Singapore English

ABSTRACTThis article discusses the findings of research on the use of particles in the vernacular speech of university students in Singapore, with particular reference to language variation and how meaningful social information is conveyed through the use of such particles. One key argument here is that the particles may be used to indicate speaker identity at the individual level, and across the Singapore speech community. This study draws on an adapted form of social network theory, and uses vernacular data to capture the dynamics underlying particle variation and therole these play in the construction of ‘Singapore English’.

Pronoun omission in high-contact varieties of English

AbstractThis paper considers pronoun omission in different varieties of English. It argues that omitted pronouns simplify structures if their referents are accessible in discourse, which explains the greater frequency of this grammatical feature in high-contact varieties of English, spoken in speech communities with a history of high numbers of second-language users. A corpus study of two high-contact varieties, Indian English and Singapore English, and a low-contact one, British English, is conducted in order to examine the distribution of omitted and overt pronouns. As expected, pronoun omission is more frequent in the high-contact varieties than in British English. Moreover, pronouns are omitted almost exclusively when they have highly accessible referents as antecedents, which is not a conventionalized feature of the grammars of Indian or Singapore English, where overt pronouns are the default choice when referring to antecedents.

Wh-questions in Singapore English Revisited

Wh-questions in Singapore English Revisited

English in Singapore: striking a new balance for future-readiness

English in Singapore has always presented a balancing act for its founders. The colonial era saw a distinct role for English, i.e. to produce English-speaking officers for the British administration, while modern Singapore sees English being used as both a national and international lingua franca and as a major language that connects the island city-state to the world. ‘English-knowing bilingualism’ has gained ascendancy in Singapore and may become a core competency for the 21st-century world with the rise in status of English as a global language. However, the path to English-knowing bilingualism in the pluri-lingual and heterogeneous country was often marked by paradoxical debates surrounding the issues of language maintenance and shift, identity and the transmission of values, equity and meritocracy, as well as balancing between local versus global linguistic norms and standards. This paper focuses on the continuing debates, from the past to the present, as new challenges arise and argues how a new balance has to be achieved in the language strategy, policy and management for future-readiness in Singapore.

Revisiting the Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Writing Instruction in a Multicultural Context

Given the multimodal and multicultural character of modern English, English Language Teaching should meaningfully reflect this. Although some attempts have been made, adequate attention has not been paid to reforming writing pedagogy. This paper presents the findings of a two-year research project on writing instruction in the Singapore English Language classroom, which caters for a mixture of EFL (English as a foreign language), L2 (second language) and L1 (first language) learners. Data were gathered from six secondary school teachers via observations and interviews through which their common practices and beliefs were established. Our findings revealed an extensive use of examination-centred practices based on functional literacy, routine procedures and standardisation, rather than a pedagogy that promotes social equity and cultural and linguistic diversity as advocated by the New London Group. Following their work, we argue that student agency, critical literacy, and socially and culturally situated learning should be integrated into all writing classrooms for effective learning to take place.

Light verb semantics in theInternational Corpus of English: onomasiological variation, identity evidence and degrees of lightness

This study employs corpus semantic techniques to examine the semantics of light verbs and light verb constructions (LVCs) in Singapore English, Hong Kong English and British English via their respective components in theInternational Corpus of English(ICE; Greenbaum 1996). The study investigates onomasiological variation (see Geeraertset al.1994) by identifying selection preferences in natural use between light verb constructions and their related verb alternatives. In addition,identity evidenceis forwarded as a valuable corpus semantic tool, in which instances of naturally occurring language data resemble classic identity tests for polysemy. Via a close reading and manual semantic analysis of thousands of instances of lightmake,take,giveand their semantic alternatives, this study finds remarkable consistency across the three varieties of World Englishes (WEs) in onomasiological preferences, even in extremely nuanced features of LVCs. Onomasiological evidence and identity evidence also suggest the new finding that the three light verbs and their constructions exhibitdegrees of lightness, and that these degrees of lightness are extremely consistent across regional varieties.

Adaptation of Chinese and English versions of the Ankylosing Spondylitis quality of life (ASQoL) scale for use in Singapore

BackgroundTo cross-culturally adapt and validate the Singapore Chinese and Singapore English versions of the Ankylosing Spondylitis Quality of Life (ASQoL) scales.MethodsTranslation of the ASQoL into Singapore Chinese and English was performed by professional and lay translation panels. Field-testing for face and content validity was performed by interviewing ten Chinese speaking and ten English speaking axial spondyloarthritis (AxSpA) patients. AxSpA patients (either Chinese or English speaking) were invited to take part in validation surveys. The Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ), Short Form Health Survey (SF-36), Bath Indices, and other measures of disease activity were used as comparator scales for convergent validity. A separate sample of AxSpA patients were invited to participate in a test-retest postal study, with 2 weeks between administrations.ResultsThe cross-sectional study included 183 patients (77% males, 82% English speaking), with a mean (SD) age of 39.4 (13.7) years. The ASQoL had excellent internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.88), and correlated moderately with all the comparator scales. The ASQoL was able to distinguish between patients grouped by disease activity and perceived general health. The ASQoL fulfilled the Rasch model analysis for fit, reliability and unidimensionality requirements. No significant differential item functioning was noted for gender, age below or above 50 years, and language of administration. Test–retest reliability was good (r = 0.81).ConclusionsThe ASQoL was adapted into Singapore Chinese and English language versions, and shown to be culturally relevant, valid and reliable when used with combined samples of AxSpA patients who speak either Chinese or English.

Third culture kids in the outer circle: The development of sociolinguistic knowledge among local and expatriate children in Singapore

AbstractChildren acquiring sociolinguistic knowledge in transnational migration settings must learn to evaluate multiple languages and dialects in a fluid, multifaceted social landscape. This study examines the sociolinguistic development of local and expatriate children in Singapore and investigates the extent to which they share sociolinguistic knowledge and norms. One hundred fourteen children ages five to nineteen completed a region identification task and an occupation judgment task, focusing on their perception of four regional English varieties: Australian English, Northern-China-accented English, Filipino English, and Singapore English. While all groups performed well on the region identification task, expatriate children outperformed locals within the youngest age group. Singaporean and expatriate children attending local schools showed greater familiarity with local norms than international school students in their occupation ratings. Participants mapped speakers to occupations by general prestige level, suggesting that children rely on indirect knowledge of social status rather than direct experience with speakers in their development of sociolinguistic evaluation. (Children's sociolinguistic development, transnational migration, language attitudes)*

Textese and Singlish in multiparty chats

ABSTRACTPrior research has shown that orthographic Singlish often occurs with textese features in asynchronous Internet registers. This article presents findings from multiparty chats among Singapore youths, which suggest that a principle of decipherability governs the textisms based on standardized Singapore English and Singlish. Most textisms were contractive due to the pressure to abbreviate messages to keep up with the rapidity of multiparty chats, although orthographic Singlish was largely not abbreviated. The results indicate that the preponderance of abbreviation in standardized Singapore English and the relative dearth of abbreviation may be explained by the effects of ‘abbreviation asymmetry’ as an enregistered variable distinguishing the two Englishes.

On the empty O-corner of the Aristotelian Square: A view from Singapore English

The problem of the absence of lexicalisation of the O-corner of the Aristotelian Square of Oppositions has challenged the field of pragmatics for many decades, and various explanations have been offered in an attempt to resolve it. The majority of the recent explanations have referred to the operation of Gricean or neo-Gricean scalar implicatures, though few have taken into consideration the significance of reanalysis of adjacent constituents. The present study looks at the interaction between negation and quantifiers in Singapore English, in which the tendency is for (universal) quantifier scope to hold precedence over negative scope, even when the quantifier follows the negation in the clause. A brief spontaneous survey of Singaporean speakers containing a passivization task and comparing a range of universal quantifiers reveals that the syntactic adjacency of the negation and the quantifier is the most likely factor affecting the presence or absence of O-corner lexicalisation in the Aristotelian Square. This is particularly relevant in the case of quantifiers of time, such as always.