English vs Malay, the never ending debate in Malaysia

This is a never-ending debate where probably there will be no winners, more certainly all losers at the end of the day. None will make it even as a footnote in history. So much for the hype that surrounds the language issue in Malaysia.

Currently the polemics on the language issue revolves around the importance of the English language vis-à-vis Bahasa Melayu, the latter mistakenly considered by language fanatics and chauvinists as synonymous with Bahasa Malaysia. But more on this later as we need to digress a little here.

Where did Bahasa Melayu come from?

Again, for starters, one problem is that the Federal Constitution states that Bahasa Melayu, not Bahasa Malaysia, is the bahasa kebangsaan (national language).

Officially, Bahasa Melayu has fallen into disuse as it has been overtaken and eclipsed by Bahasa Malaysia which, in any case, is not the bahasa kebangsaan if we interpret the Federal Constitution strictly.

Bahasa Melayu, to add insult to injury, is a dead language and getting deader with the years.

In short, we do not have a bahasa kebangsaan at the moment. So much for the language fanatics and chauvinists! Their egotistical balloon, based on “racist” hype and more hype, needs to be pricked once and for all.

If it’s any solace for them, the Hindus and Buddhists of old who laboured for hundreds of years to turn the original Malay dialect from the Khmer Empire into the lingua franca of Nusantara – the Malay Archipelago after Malay the language must be turning in their graves. The Malay dialect, in their hands, became transformed through the heavy infusion of Sanskrit and Pali (a Sanskrit dialect used by the Buddhists) words to emerge as the language of the missionaries, trade, administration and education.

Along the way, a small group in Nusantara who adopted Bahasa Melayu as their mother tongue, decided to call themselves Melayu. This definition has now entered the Federal Constitution of Malaysia.

A Malay, according to the Malaysian Constitution, is a Muslim who habitually speaks Malay and practices Malay culture, customs and traditions, whatever that means. This is a unique first in the world, but a legal no no, in the sense that a religious community is identified with a language to be passed off as a race.

This means that non-Muslims in Malaysia can never call themselves Malay even if they adopt Bahasa Melayu as their mother tongue. However, this has not prevented people in China from correctly referring to the Chinese in Malaysia as Chinese Malay. Similarly, the people in Tamil Nadu, India, refer to Indians in Malaysia as Malayakaran (Malaya people).

This brings us to Bahasa Melayu vs Bahasa Malaysia before we move on to Bahasa Melayu/Bahasa Malaysia vs English and other languages.

Bahasa Melayu is not the same as Bahasa Malaysia

The difference between Bahasa Melayu and Bahasa Malaysia is clear. The latter has Bahasa Melayu has the base and superimposed on this are words and terminology from other local dialects and languages. This is topped off with words borrowed from English.

Meanwhile, the English language itself derives from two Germanic dialects, Angles and Saxon, enriched by Danish dialects and Norman French, and topped off with Greek and Latin.

Bahasa Melayu, again, our dead bahasa kebangsaan, and to recap, is the old Malay dialect from the Khmer Empire. This is the dialect which stopped living after receiving an infusion of Sanskrit and Pali words and, briefly, a number of Arabic terms limited to Islam.

Bahasa Melayu is not bahasa Indonesia either, as propagated by the hype of Rumpun Melayu politicians. Rumpun Melayu only exists in the fertile imaginations of the self-servings racists in politics. No one in Indonesia, for example, works himself into a fit over Rumpun Melayu.

Like Bahasa Malaysia, Bahasa Indonesia has Bahasa Melayu as the base, superimposed with words from Javanese and Sundanese – the two major languages in Indonesia – and other languages and dialects, Dutch and English.

Officially, Bahasa Melayu is as dead in Indonesia as in Malaysia.

Obviously this means that those who are rooting for Bahasa Melayu against English can be said to be trying to revive a dead language. They should look to UNESCO and not take to the streets to create trouble, for no rhyme or reason, or go crying to the court.

Excessive posturing

If the language fanatics and chauvinists want to qualify their struggle and say that they are actually trying to protect Bahasa Malaysia, under the Bahasa Melayu label, they are still barking up the wrong tree. Bahasa Malaysia is not the bahasa kebangsaan and hence it’s supremacy or otherwise does not arise. This is to put it strictly in the legal and constitutional sense. Bahasa Melayu, the dead language, is the bahasa kebangsaan.

The bottomline line is that we should stop trying to posture on the issue of language in Malaysia. Let’s face it. Language skills, no matter what language, is not a particularly strong point with Malaysians. We are not only weak in English, a great problem in America and other English-speaking countries too; we are also weak in Bahasa Malaysia and our respective mother tongues including Bahasa Melayu.

So, let’s debate instead on whether we can make choices available to the children of today so that they grow up communicating in one language to bring them all together while being proficient in the English language and speaking another at home.

Patently, we need to speak better Bahasa Malaysia and make it the language of choice in our daily life outside our homes. Let’s leave the local dialects, Bahasa Melayu, Tamil, Punjabi, Chinese, Portuguese, Thai, Tagalog and Filipino at home.

The role of English and the mother tongues

English should remain the sole medium of instruction at the pre-university, college and university level and for obvious reasons. This needs no elaboration. Those who beg to differ will go on flogging the issue to death until thy kingdom come.

Primary education should be in the mother tongue with Bahasa Malaysia and English being taught as single subjects. A child is best educated in the mother tongue. This is the position taken by the United Nations through UNESCO.

Tamil, Chinese and Bahasa Melayu are not the only mother tongues in Malaysia.

We must not forget the Orang Asli dialects in Peninsular Malaysia; Iban, Bidayuh, Melanau, Orang Ulu and Sarawak Malay in Sarawak; the Dusunic and Murut dialects and languages in Sabah, along with Bajau, Suluk, Tagalog, Filipino and Bugis.

The children speaking all these languages have the right to get an education in their mother tongue.

At the secondary school level, education should be bi-lingual in Bahasa Malaysia and English with the mother tongues including Bahasa Melayu being retained as single subjects.

The mother tongue can be retained as single subject at the pre-university, college and university level too.

We need to bring sanity back in the debate on the language issue so that the children will not become the sacrificial lambs for politicians. It’s high time too that politics and the race factor are taken out of education in Malaysia.

Malaysia Chronicle