Young Malaysians should take heed, say scholars
Dr Bromeley Philip
ENGLISH is still relevant in Malaysia because at some point in life, the people have to use it.
The world economies and cultures are becoming increasingly interconnected and interdependent politically, socially and technologically with English as the main language used.
Although English has been viewed by certain quarters as hegemonic (a form of neo-colonisation) as it permeates life domains, influencing and probably displacing some aspects of cultures of non-English peoples worldwide, English is an irresistible world language because it acts as the most popular lingua franca for the great majority of the world communities.
According to a renowned British linguist David Graddol, English is now the international currency of science and technology.
English is the global language of experiment and discovery. Academic journals in many countries have shifted, since World War II, from publishing in their national language to publishing in English.
In his book The Future of English (2000), Graddol said: “Worldwide, there are 1,400 million people living in countries where English has official status. One out of five of the world’s population speaks English to some level of competence. English is the main language of books, newspapers, airports and air-traffic control, international businesses and academic conferences, science, technology, diplomacy, sport, international competitions, pop music and advertising.”
Assoc professor Dr Bromeley Philip, a Universiti Teknologi Mara senior lecturer, said not only is English used in scientific publishing but also book publication.
“Worldwide, English is the most popular language of publication. English and computers have seemed, for decades, to go together. Computers and the programmes which make them useful were largely the inventions of the English-speaking countries,” he added.
“The software and hardware reflected the needs of the English language. Most advanced computer tools and the creation of the Internet are in the English language. No doubt, English is a very important language of technological progress and a 1995 global index on the influence of languages worldwide indicated English ranked number one with 100 per cent impact.”
Top global language
On the world status of English, Bromeley explained: “Based on Professor Kachru’s (Indian professor of World Englishes) English circles, (inset), Malaysia is in the ‘outer circle’ where the second language (L2) speakers of English reside in large numbers. Being in the ‘outer circle’ implies that English occupies a significant functional status in the educational, occupational, administrative, technological, economic, political and social domains.
“This means that Malaysians particularly the young ones have no choice but to attempt to master English as a very important additional language of wider communication because no doubt that English has been and still is the number one global language that transcends borders worldwide.”
Quoting Kachru, Bromeley said there were three types of English speakers in the World – English circles (Kachru, 1985). They are as per indicated in the following diagram.
Which English model?
A British model of English is commonly taught to students learning English as a second language (ESL) in Europe, Africa, India, much of Asia including Malaysia.
This type of English is variously referred to as Oxford English, BBC English and even the Queen’s English. For a long time, however, phoneticians have called this type of English Received Pronunciation (RP) in the Victorian era — one meaning of ‘received’ was ‘socially acceptable’.
This is the type of English that is considered ‘standard’ since it is the favoured educational model, particularly in its written form according to Professor Jenkins (2000).
Therefore, it is possible to say when one refers to a Standard English, one is actually referring to the British model of English, usually known as the Received Pronunciation or RP model.
Bromeley pointed out that as a major part of British legacy, the British model of English has become an acceptable standard in Malaysia even though it is
not spelt out clearly as to which model is being used in the Malaysian English language curriculum.
The Curriculum Development Centre, he added, did state once as far as spoken English was concerned, the instructional objectives were to teach students to speak using correct pronunciation, and with correct intonation, word stress and rhythm.
But there are no prescriptive guidelines as to what is correct pronunciation and intonation.
What seems to be emerging as a pedagogical-classroom model in non-native English-speaking countries like Malaysia or Singapore, according to Professor Kachru, is the educated standard variety of English.
‘Educated’ here is defined as ‘formal education, usually up to and including the tertiary level’.
According to him in Malaysia, however, it’s not sufficient to classify the model as the ‘educated’ standard variety of English.
This is because being educated does not necessarily mean one is able to speak the so-called Standard English or RP.
Nonetheless, it can still be said in Malaysia the acceptable standard is still the one closer to the British acceptable norm (Standard English-RP model) as far as possible.
In this respect too, professor Saran Kaur Gill of the School of Languages and Linguistics, UKM, postulates that a model acceptable and intelligible internationally needs to be as close as possible to the British model in terms of syntax, lexis and phonology while at the same time, the speaker-user still maintains his or her ethnic identity.
According to Saran, as far as spoken English, and hence pronunciation, is concerned, there is no clear-cut acceptance as yet as to which model is really appropriate for the Malaysian linguistic landscape.
This means it is not easy to prescribe a spoken model of English pronunciation to the multi-ethnic Malaysian speakers but it is possible to obtain views of these diverse learners as to the sort of model that they would aspire to.
Saran found most tertiary learners prefer the ‘educated variety’ as Standard English for Malaysia because that variety approximates the British model.