Bilingualism

Relating your reading ‘input’ to the real world is a great output. Just like a student always tries to relate what they’ve learnt at school to something more realistic. Your world is certainly getting much better. Even your profound understanding makes the educational process more enjoyable and pleasing. Aha, this is such a key point because I’m gonna share with you shortly my previous reading that’s closely connected to the world I live in.

Before that, I’ve got a question here: Have you ever heard the adjective ‘bilingual’? If never, please go look up the word in dictionary. Oxford dictionary is an excellent choice. By the way, you would’ve less time and hope me for help. Alright, then. I’d looked it up FYI. The definition given in my Oxford Advanced Learner’s dictionary (International Student’s Edition) is ‘being able to speak two languages equally well because you’ve used them since you’re young’. Aha, you’ve got it? I hope so.  

Now, let’s take your mind off the definition for a while. If not, this could possibly be irrelevant to the main focus of my writing (in fact, typing). Speaking about the issue bilingualism, it does occur in most countries all over the globe either in the continents of Asia, Africa, the US etc. Guess what? MALAYSIA is inclusive. Ah, excuse me? Yeah, you can be thinking about the Malays who occupy 65% of Malaysia’s entire population. Do accept my apology in that I’m not the least bit thinking so.

Frankly speaking, I’m talking about other nationalities that exist in Malaysia besides the Malays. Some of these nations initially came as immigrants on this land and the rest are Bumiputras such as the Melanaus, the Orang Aslis, the Ibans, the Kadazans and many others. As Bahasa Melayu has become the national language in this region, in other words, the non-Malays are required to study the subject Bahasa Melayu at school and compulsorily pass it. The need to pass the language subject is vital for a job seeker within the country whether they aspire to work in the government sector particularly.

Of my observation, what’s so unique is that the non-Malays seem just lucky for being bilingual indirectly. Not only can they speak in their mother tongue so well, but are also fluent in Bahasa Melayu. At present, there’s no big deal when a Chinese Malaysian is able to speak both Mandarin (or other Chinese dialects) and Bahasa Melayu properly. Seeing that the English language is officially the second language here, the non-Malay citizens have one more specialty with their proficiency in speaking English. That makes them multilingual. How amazing! It’s undeniable that such a circumstance is mostly undergone by immigrants.

Hang on a second! Are there any bilingual Malays too? What about a multilingual Malay? Absolutely, there surely are. Taking Malaysians living in a foreign country like the United Kindgom, Australia and whatnot for instance, they’re among the bilingual and multilingual – but nevertheless on one condition, namely they must be able to speak two diverse languages to be a bilingual and more than two languages to belong to the multilingual.

Well…what if we can speak Bahasa Melayu and English pretty well? Do we belong to the bilingual as well? Hmm… sounds good, doesn’t it? I guess why not? We definitely are!

Grammar Vs. Spoken English

Suppose you’ve already read one of my recent posts, I’m pretty sure you may have believed that grammar is my number 1 basis to learn a language like English. You may be right. We’ll see. 

Click here if you haven't: http://keyrolnua.blogspot.com/2011/07/my-secret-recipe-how-to-score-english.html

How d’ you feel about the statement ‘Malaysians speak very formal English’?

I see this is the truth as Malaysians most commonly go to a national school or a national type school where standard British English is generally taught at. The Malaysians are therefore constantly facing a little mess primarily in understanding what the English speak. 

Idioms, proverbs, slang and other literary devices including personification, metaphor and simile – these are merely a quarter of the key elements in the English language that help beautify the art of the language and so do many other languages.

In spite of the fact that these elements are essential in a language acquisition, only will Malaysian school children be exposed in detail when they begin knowing literature components (Bahasa & English) in their secondary school education. In contrast, the emphasis of literature in Advanced Arabic is too little. How come? 

The Malay proverb ‘Melentur buluh biarlah dari rebungnya’ stresses the significance of education at the early age, ever since a baby can see the world. Let’s scratch that for a sec., shall we?

There’s a couple of most popular ‘patterns’ of communication in our daily routine: writing and speaking. I think I’d better put it this way: Writing is formal and speaking is informal. Recalling what I studied in the subject ‘Discourse Analysis’ at Uni, writing is classified ‘formal’ because it’s something well planned and speaking isn’t. I guess if speaking were a well planned thing, a speaker would take time to utter a word and that’s flipping nonsense!  

Thus, grammar doesn’t always come first. It really does especially in essay writing but when it comes to speaking, the English have to take grammar for granted sometimes. Take note whether you determine to speak English so good as the English native speaker.

It seems as though a trend nowadays that informal English is more frequently applied either on TV, radio, daily papers or whatnot. This big exposure of informal English is also seen in English movies. Watching English movies is a means of improving one’s English communication skills. This is very good for a second language speaker like us so we aren’t too much orientated towards formal English which makes us nerdy, hello!

Slang such as ‘guys’, ‘dude’, ‘wanna’, ‘gotta’ is regularly used in spoken English. Go find out yourselves what these slangs stand for or you won’t learn anything. 

Click here to learn more on British Slang:

 http://www.effingpot.com/slang.shtml

When interacting, the way you converse with a bosom friend and a lecturer is totally unlike. The way you communicate with your dearest parents and with little children are never the same either. A teenage boy would probably wish ‘peace out’ to his buddies which simply means ‘goodbye’ or ‘see you around’.

Think of abbreviations in modal verbs like shall [ I’ll do it ] and would [ He’d be back soon ]. Now, think of ‘Be’ verbs like am, is, are, was, were as in [ I’m playing computer games ] and ‘Have’ verbs in the subsequent sentences [ She’s gone to work ] and [ I’ve got to go! ].

The English normally seem to leave out such verbs and just pronounce them in abbreviation form that have the second language learners bewildered and blur. And that’s the distinction we can obviously see on Malaysians today who tend to mention word by word. The native speakers won’t get trouble to see what we’re trying to say, conversely we shall.

I’d like to insist on the utmost necessity of learning informal English rather than concentrating too much upon formal English. I’m not telling you that learning formal English isn’t the least bit crucial, yet informal English can never be taken for granted just like that.

My lecturer loved stressing the obligation of an English teacher to speak as much formal British English as possible in class. At the same time, clarify to them any slang terms in our lessons, if any. This kind of step will avoid students’ misunderstanding.

Grammar is to be learnt to make us proficient in the international language. Nevertheless, the essentiality of informal English knowledge oughtn’t to be forgotten. Both of them are equally vital!

In a video I watched via YouTube the other year, this English tutor suggested that learn phrases! Strictly speaking, I’ve no favourite links yet which assist me in phrases. I benefit English movies a lot and learn English phrases from. On top of that, our current film industry has been flooded with American movies. Whether we like it or not, we’ll be served with American English much often. Sooner or later, our English will turn to be so American, to my mind. 


Now, I am gonna leave you with this how-to-speak-English-fluently video. Enjoy watching!


Click here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qs5vBuvsYU4&feature=related