Once Again, English, Our English (1994)

All the Malay and English newspapers, except one, gave it banner headlines. And so they should. It was one of the most important speeches the Prime Minister gave in 1993. It announced a significant shift in the Government’s policy on the use of English as a medium of instruction in the universities. Once again Dr Mahathir showed quiet determination not to allow sentimental pieties over language to be a dead weight that slows down the country’s march towards the dream year 2020.

The commitment to the total use of Bahasa Malaysia (Malay Language) in every area of learning, especially in science and technology, has turned out to be problematic. Shortage of qualified teachers capable of teaching in BM, of competent translators who could make available essential texts existing only in English – these are among the major factors that have made a slight change in strategy necessary, without, however, compromising fundamental commitments and principles or the sense of national pride.

Permitting the use of (or a return to) English as the medium of instruction in such technical subjects as medicine, engineering and computer science is the logical thing to do under the circumstances. The language is already there, part of our colonial inheritance; what is needed now is to make that particular inheritance whole and healthy again, and to undo the damage done to it (a serious decline in standards mainly) by fanatical nationalistic enthusiasms over the decades since Independence. And to do this without feeling any guilt, of being assailed by the sense of having betrayed our sacred identity as Malaysians (for the chauvinists, “identity as Malays,” no doubt). The slogan Bahasa Jiwa Bangsa (language is the soul of the nation) does have a degree of truth in it, so long we are not too literal or rigid about both “language” and “soul.”

The Government’s decision may be entirely pragmatic in its motivation. The concern behind it is the pursuit of progress. In particular, the target of the fully developed, highly competitive nation respected by the world in the year 2020.  It has become a compulsive ritual now that every time a good word is said about English, immediate assurance about the sacred status of the National Language is given. No one wants to be misunderstood, least of all a politician, and on such a sacrosanct matter too. It has happened before (remember last year, when the Prime Minister’s very faith in BM was questioned?) – and there’s no guarantee it won’t happen again.

So the Prime Minister again gave his assurance and to make double sure, his new Deputy also gave his. “In 1993,” he said, “we are more confident of the strength of Bahasa Malaysia (note, he said “Malaysia” not “Melayu”)… There should be no cause for concern if we want our younger generation to improve their English.” Anwar even reminded Malaysians that the Nineties are not like the Sixties – that decade of tension when he was a troublesome student leader in University Malaya. (Remember?). Outside the area with which the Prime Minister’s speech was immediately concerned, the place of Bahasa Malaysia as the first language of the nation is secure – even if only in the public sector, not the private. This officially-sanctioned return of English for a specific practical purpose is not only not a threat to the status of Bahasa Malaysia; it will also, said the Prime Minister, benefit the National Language itself in the long run.

The idea that giving English its proper and necessary place in our life can even help BM is something new in Dr M’s thinking and public utterance on the question of language. “We are of the opinion,” he said, “that once we emerge as a successful race (nation?) our language will also be successful and will gain respect.” This opinion was echoed by a number of academic and public figures - the Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Universiti Pertanian Malaysia (Malaysian Agricultural University) being one of them. So “success” is the keyword – key to everything, including the attainment of that position which compels the respect of the entire world.

The reactions from the academics and intellectuals to Dr M’s speech have been generally favourable. A few voiced anxiety that the move would be at the expense of Bahasa Malaysia. A group of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia lecturers wrote a very pertinent letter to the New Straits Times (January 1) saying that, while they are not opposed to the necessary shift in policy, it’s not enough for the Government to do just that. The whole education system, they rightly say, needs to be reformed, particularly as it applies to the teaching of English Language vis-a-vis the “Soul of the Nation.” Successful Malaysia in the 2020’s with have her “soul” expressed in BM, helped not a little by a judiciously pragmatic use of the world’s lingua franca and most convenient means to economic and technological competitiveness. But what kind of “soul”? And will this Malaysian soul be expressed in purely secular material terms? If you asked the president of Gapena he would probably say, absolutely, yes – i.e., if he could forgive the Mahathir government even that minimum role granted to English.

I have argued in this column more than once that English was playing and would continue to play an important role not only in our relations with the rest of the world, but within our own multi-ethnic society. And that role is by no means merely economic, scientific or technological. After more than three decades of independence, and despite the National Education Policy, English is still used widely in our country. And what’s important, that use cuts across ethnic boundaries. Now, with the slogan or motto Bahasa Jiwa Bangsa in mind, would any unblinkered Malaysian say that our “Malaysian soul,” however ill-defined and ambiguous it may be, can only be expressed in the National Language? A language belongs to those who speak it. It’s as simple as that. Given this fact, and that language communicates experience and is capable of transcending the boundaries of the culture of its origin – given all this, then the English we speak in Malaysia today belongs to us. It’s our English; along with BM it expresses our “soul,” with all its contradictions and confusions, as much as our social and material needs.

The idea that true nationhood is impossible without a native language to express the sense is not always true. Just look at Ireland. Much of the spirit of her rebellion against England was expressed in the English language. Ireland in fact made the language of her colonial masters her own, and defined herself in that language. In the process, she produced some of the greatest writers in English. Though Ireland and Malaysia do have certain things in common (most of them not very nice), the two countries are very different otherwise. For one, unlike the virtually dead Gaelic (the native language of the republic), BM is very much alive. Unlike poor Ireland, therefore, we Malaysians have more than one language in which to express our “Soul.” Isn’t that all the better?

5 January 1994

Yes to BM and English (1992)

Kassim Ahmad (9 September 1933 ~ 10 October 2017)

Last week, Pena (the national writers union) held a one-day seminar at the Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka on the theme ‘The Role of Language in Nation Building’. The seminar was somewhat unusual in that most of the speakers were people from the corporate world. They included a banker, a gentleman from the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange, an advertising lady executive, and a representative of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Only one sasterawan was in the list, Kassim Ahmad (an untypical sasterawan, anyway), and he didn’t give a paper but participated in a forum that concluded the seminar proper. When I saw the list of participants, I said to myself: Now, this one should be different. Unlike the usual sasterawan-dominated seminars, this one won’t be lost in the fumes of endless chatter about the maruah (honour) of the nation (or race?), and other sasterawan-ish obsessions. This seminar should get down to the nitty-gritty to confront the problems that still seem to check the widespread use of the national language in the private sector, not to raise basic issues that had long been settled.

The composition of the seminar wasn’t really surprising. Pena is now headed by Datuk Ahmad Sebi Abu Bakar, a successful corporate man and writer, who was elected president early this year. The election of the Datuk signalled the entry in a crucial way of the corporate presence into the literary sector, an event enthusiastically welcomed by some, less by others (the latter being the incorrigible sceptics or cynics, of course, who cannot but see the marriage of the corporate sector with the literary as ‘unholy’; I personally don’t see why this should necessarily be so).

The business of language and national building is quite complex and complicated, especially the question of the place of English in relation to the national language. I’ve discussed the issue more than once in my writings. Each time, it seemed the stand I took was either misunderstood or presented in a distorted manner to the non English-reading Malay public by the guardians of the maruah (honour) or semangat kebangsaan Melayu. The misunderstanding or distortion seemed to be inevitable every time someone took a pragmatic stand and defended the place of English in our country. Having a favourable attitude to English in our country meant lack of pride in the national language, if not silent unpatriotic resistance to its widespread use, especially in the private and corporate sectors. If even the Prime Minister himself could be misunderstood by a leading Malay daily, what more people like me?

‘People like me’ means English-educated Malays, especially those educated in Mat Salleh countries. But there are more than one kind of English-educated Malays: those who are bilingual in speech, thinking, writing – and love-making; those who are mainly English speaking and speak Malay only to their servants, drivers and caddies; those (admittedly a very small minority) who cannot or can hardly speak their own mother tongue and if compelled by circumstance to do so would have to take lessons in it. The existence of these different groups of English-educated Malays doesn’t seem to make any difference to the noisy nationalists when it comes to labelling or categorising Malay defenders of English. They are lumped together as middle-class cultural renegades or apostates. The fact that people like me write in both languages is not proof enough of my loyalty to Malay.

What's wrong with polyglot haircuts?

The ironic thing is that even among the noisy nationalists there are English-educated (or semi-English-educated) persons who would slip into English, whether consciously or unconsciously, especially when speaking on intellectual matters to another English-educated fellow Malay. I don’t want to name names, but I can tell you I know a number of nationalist literary politicians and academics (some of them quite well-known, and all of them bumigeois) who do this. It seems that despite all the noise they make about the purity of their national souls they cannot resist, unconsciously or consciously, the snob appeal of the language of the former colonial masters. This is a kind of hypocrisy, if not schizophrenia. It is less honourable than the attitude of those hotel waiters, 7-Eleven shop assistants and employees of fast food restaurants, who speak to their guests or customers in English almost all the time, as if they were all tourists. These people are not hypocrites; they are just simple minds bedazzled by the bourgeois lifestyle who think that it is expected of them to speak in English and feel quite sophisticated doing so – “Is that all, sir?”; “Thank you, sir.” To be fair to these people, it should also be said that they often speak in English because the milieu they work in is dominated by people who speak a lot. And since their job is to please their customers, they find themselves speaking in English quite naturally, although they know that their customers would understand them perfectly if they stick to Malay.

Finance Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, in his speech opening the Pena seminar, reiterated the importance of English as a second language, but reminded corporate and private sector leaders of their social responsibility in helping to extend and improve the use of the national language in their sectors. That the use of the national language in these sectors is very limited, and that even that limited use is unsatisfactory in terms of quality were frankly acknowledged by a number of the speakers at the seminar. Improving the quality of Bahasa Malaysia used in the private and corporate sectors is the least difficult of the problems. What is really difficult is the creation of an environment that will motivate these people to use the language spontaneously, without directives from above. Employees can be directed to use the national language in all business correspondence within the country, but they can’t be forced to speak the language to customers or clients, or among themselves.

I personally have always believed that in matters of language, compulsion (legal or semi-legal) can be used only in certain areas. And even in those areas there are sub-areas where it would be madness to use compulsion in whatever form. Take our national schools, for example: I’ve noticed that in schools where the pupils are ethnically mixed, English is often the language used outside the classrooms, certainly when the conversation is among non-Malays and quite often between Malays and non-Malays. Is there something that is so reprehensible that steps must be taken to stop it? My answer would be a resounding No.

David Chua, deputy secretary general of the Association of Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry, said in his paper that one of the reasons why Bahasa Malaysia is so little used in the private and corporate sectors is the fact that the generation who were educated under the national education system, now in their 30s, have not yet ascended to the positions of power and influence in those sectors. Perhaps; but I personally doubt it. I think when the present under-40s become corporate leaders, as quite a few of them already are, English will still be their main language of communication.

The plain fact is we are a linguistically plural society with English as a very widely used second language among middle-class Malaysians. And the present widespread use of English will continue as long as we are exposed to information signals in English from overseas. There is not much that the Government can legitimately do about this essentially healthy exposure, as long as it remains wisely deaf to the demands of regressive elements in our society; those elements who would want it to resort to non-democratic methods to preserve the purity of the ‘national culture.’

Chua also attributed the limited use of Bahasa Malaysia in the private and corporate sectors to the confusion caused by the constant and sometimes conflicting changes in policies regarding the language – the question of spelling, the business of Bahasa Baku and all that jazz. The worst confusion of all was caused by sudden irrational change of the name for our national language from Bahasa Malaysia to Bahasa Melayu. Why, after more than three decades of independence, it was thought necessary to make the change, God knows. But one can’t blame those who see in the change a disturbing sign of regression, because a non-ethnic term that had served up well for so long was suddenly dropped for one loaded with divisive connotations.

Since, as far as I know, there has been no ministerial pronouncement on the change, I’ll stick to good old Bahasa Malaysia. If it was good enough for the founding fathers of the nation, it’s good enough for me. I notice that I’m not alone in my preference; the veteran journalist, writer and nationalist Pak Samad Ismail still uses the name Bahasa Malaysia in his Berita Harian column Bila Sauh DiLabuh. Good on you, Pak Samad!

25 November 1992