Coaxing Yarns out of Disjointed Sentences: from Instrumentality to Identity and Culture in Standard English

JEREMY LIM University of Toronto [email protected]

The Singapore government (the People's Action Party) stresses the importance of standard English through the education system, the press, and also the Speak Good English Movement (SGEM, launched in 2000). In this paper, I focus on the press and the SGEM to discuss two official approaches to the promotion of Singapore Standard English. One approach has involved emphasizing an SSE that is instrumental in ensuring Singapore’s growth in the global economy. The other approach involves allowing SSE to serve identity and cultural functions. My paper argues that Singapore's language policy is shifting beyond the economic instrumentality of the nation-building period; at the same time, a more culturally adaptable SSE has emerged in a citizen-led SGEM event and some autobiographical narratives published in the press.

Economic Survival and Instrumental SSE in Postcolonial Singapore

The history of Singapore’s instrumental language policy can be traced back to the country’s pre- independent days, when heated conflicts between Malaysian and Singaporean governments over granting ethnic Malays special Bumiputera (‘son of the soil’) heightened racial tensions. After declaring independence from Britain in 1963, limited natural resources and communist threats compelled a predominantly Chinese group of Singaporean leaders to join the Malaysian government, but the two governments maintained irreconcilable views about the race-based Bumiputera policy. Whereas the Singaporean leaders wanted a meritocratic society, the Malaysian government wanted to assert the supremacy of ethnic Malays. When Singapore was ejected from Malaysia in 1965, racial tensions continued to cause social unrest in the tiny nation that faced an uncertain economic future. There was an urgent need to establish a lingua franca to defuse racial tensions and bridge Chinese, Indian, and Malay communities. Consequently, the Singapore government retained the colonial English as a racially neutral medium that all Singaporeans could access regardless of their ethnic backgrounds. In 1974, the government made the pragmatic decision of implementing English as the primary language of instruction in schools. Because English had to be learned as a foreign language by all, everyone competed ‘at From Instrumentality to Identity…in Singapore Standard English JEREMY LIM 2

school or work, on an equal footing, through their acquired skill in the English language’ (Chua 2003, 71).1 In addition to maintaining social equality and order, the race-neutral English also enabled the young nation to benefit from a globalizing economy. Lee Kuan Yew, the first Prime Minister of Singapore, firmly believed that ‘[w]ithout the English language, we [Singaporeans] might not have succeeded in teaching so quickly a whole generation the knowledge and skills which made them able to work the machines brought in from the industrialized countries of the West’ (as quoted in Wee 2003, 214). Proficiency in English served the function of providing access to the scientific and technological modernity of developed nations. The utilitarian and deracializing SSE was made doubly ‘neutral’ because of the government's concern with deculturalization. Analyzing language policy statements about the self-rule era from the late 1950s to mid-1960s, and the period of industrial development from the 1960s to the late 1980s, Rita Elaine Silver observes that while the instrumental SSE was ‘economic-development oriented’ and provided ‘opportunities for inter-ethnic communication’ (2005, 54), Asian languages were represented as having connections with ‘personal identity’, ‘a sense of heritage’, and intra-ethnic communication (53). The first Prime Minister firmly believed in suppressing Western influences in a developing society, where Mandarin, Tamil, and Malay (the institutionalized mother tongues) would fulfill identity and cultural functions for the main ethnic groups. In his words, such a language policy would prevent Singaporeans from ‘mindlessly aping the Americans or British with no basic values or culture of their own’ (PM Lee, 1972, quoted by Silver 2005, 54). In a time when policies were determined by nation- building exigencies, the pragmatic government abstracted a ‘standard’ from British/American English to generate wealth for its people.

The Government's Reactions to Mainstream Singlish

Scholars and literary writers, being concerned with cultural expression, tend to criticize the government’s language policy by associating instrumentality with inauthenticity and affirming the role of Singlish as an identity marker. Chng Huang Hoon describes Singlish as a ‘magic element that will unite all Singaporeans’ (2003, 58). Rani Rubdy argues that Singlish

has emerged as the symbol of intraethnic identity and cultural integration in Singapore, in total contravention with the ideologies of the language planners. Importantly, Singlish has come to be regarded as the quintessential mark of ‘Singaporeanness’ by a

1 Chua Beng Huat asserts that the colonial English only benefited children ‘with tertiary educated, English-speaking, parents of upper middle-class ground’ (2003, 73); and because the first generation of leaders were predominantly middle-class Chinese who ‘had access to British university education immediately after the second world war’, subsequent generations already have privileged ‘access to the limited opportunities of learning the language’ (71). According to Chua, the meritocratic promise of postcolonial SSE was an illusion—the imposition of SSE on the populace enabled a Westernized Chinese- dominant elite class to reinforce its power. From Instrumentality to Identity…in Singapore Standard English JEREMY LIM 3

large majority of young Singaporeans who now use it freely in informal domains of talk. (2005, 64)

The conviction that this ‘unplanned’ register should be celebrated as a symbol of identity is sometimes expressed in hyperbolic ways. In a widely cited TIME article, ‘A War of Words Over ‘Singlish’’, Tan Hwee Hwee distinguishes the ‘key ingredient in the unique melting pot that is Singapore’ from the internationally intelligible English that the SGEM promotes (2002, par. 6).2 Tan depicts Singlish as a gritty language rooted in the ‘unglamorous past’ of a nation ‘built from the sweat of the uncultured immigrants’ (par. 6). As the gustatory imagery in the article makes clear, Singlish is an irresistible cultural force in

a city where skyscraping banks tower over junk boats; a city where vendors hawk steaming intestines next to bistros that serve haute cuisine. The SGEM’s brand of good English is as bland as boiled potatoes. If the government has its way, Singapore will become a dish devoid of flavour. (par. 6)

Scholars do not recommend that SSE should be rejected completely; rather; they argue that Singaporeans should freely code-switch between instrumental SSE and identity Singlish. Paul Bruthiaux argues that variations ‘across varieties of English’ are ‘limited, often trivial’ (in learned and learnt, for example): in other words, the government should trust that Singaporeans can communicate effectively in a range of codes that spans the ‘continuum from standard English to Singlish’ (2010, 96). While a scholar like Bruthiaux highlights sociolectal continuities between SSE and Singlish, the Singapore government and SGEM supporters worry that many Singaporeans are not able to code-switch as effectively as privileged Singaporeans. In an article published in the local daily, , on 20 August 2008, ‘Don’t codeswitch to Singlish, please’, an SGEM supporter discourages fluent SSE speakers from code-switching. The concern was that ‘poor speakers’ might be misled into thinking there was ‘no need to increase their proficiency’ (par. 3). Likewise, in articles such as ‘Get your English right – even at kopitiam’ (Ng, My Paper) and ‘Getting it right – from the start’ (Low, The Straits Times), both published in September 2010, SGEM supporters write that Singapore needs role models to encourage fellow citizens, especially lower-class Singaporeans, to speak SSE. As reported in ‘Getting it right – from the start’, the SGEM chairman, Goh Eck Kheng, encourages SSE speakers to reach out to taxi drivers, store assistants, and food vendors working at kopitiams (food courts): in other words, the people who speak a variant that is ‘associated with a less educated group of Singaporean

2 On the SGEM website, we find archived official speeches publicizing the SGEM central tenet, that ‘Singapore will make itself more attractive to international investment, trade and tourism if its population can communicate effectively with outsiders’ in English (Bruthiaux 92-3). Examples of SGEM activities include the publication of conversations in newspapers, public performances at local, and the writing of a five-book series called Grammar Matters by the SEAMEO Regional Language Centre in Singapore. In the final section of this essay, I assert that SGEM activities in recent years are less driven by economic imperatives. From Instrumentality to Identity…in Singapore Standard English JEREMY LIM 4

speakers’ (Low 2010, par. 2-4). A non-Singaporean may question the effectiveness of such bossy statements, but the Singapore press is supervised for the purpose of guaranteeing ‘the effectiveness of the government’ and reinforcing ‘the government’s voice and the legitimacy of that voice’ within a ‘centrally planned society’ (Bokhorst-Heng 2002, 560-2). During the late 1990s, however, the government failed to win Singaporeans over with its knee-jerk reactions to Singlish. Worse, the government alienated the very people who were invested in cultivating an SSE-speaking milieu—the local English teachers. Analyzing articles published in the state-regulated daily The Straits Times during this period, Anneliese Kramer- Dahl argues that whenever the press addresses the quality of spoken English in Singapore, a climate of linguistic insecurity makes state control seem necessary. The alarmist news stories from the late 1990s include the following:

• ‘We need to beware of falling standards in the use of the language’ (‘English: Get serious’, 1999); • ‘If the less-educated half of our people end up learning to speak only Singlish, they will suffer economically and socially’ (‘Singlish “a handicap we do not wish on Singaporeans’’’, 1999); and • ‘Low English standards could also hurt the Government’s ambitious ‘thinking schools, learning nation’ plans’ (‘Teachers to go for English upgrading’, 1999).

Contributors to The Straits Times responded to these news stories by attributing falling English standards to ‘negligent’ English teachers (Kramer-Dahl 2003, 172). Because careers were at stake, these civil servants added fuel to their own paranoia by not daring to make their SSE heard.3 As Kramer-Dahl argues, this disproportionate crisis prepared the populace for ‘tour-de- force resolutions’ from the Singapore government (173). On a Sunday morning newspaper, the Ministry of Education announced its plans to send 8,000 teachers to undergo remedial ‘grammar lessons’ (174). At that time, the government's intervention backfired because the press demoralized precisely the people who were well positioned to mediate SSE to young Singaporeans. In the next section of this essay, however, I argue that the government has recently begun to validate Singaporeans who, for various reasons, have chosen SSE to symbolize identity. I draw attention to how SSE has been fulfilling identity and cultural functions in spite of the resistant pressure to speak Singlish, and also in spite of its ambivalent relation to nationalism during the postcolonial years.

3 A school principal who contributed to the article ‘Glad to upgrade but wary of load’ (Nirmala 1999) claimed that teachers ‘don’t speak good English themselves because grammar was either not taught or not emphasized when they were students’. From Instrumentality to Identity…in Singapore Standard English JEREMY LIM 5

Identity SSE

An official speech that launched the seventh year of the SGEM in 2007 is explicit about the government’s interest in moving away from a postcolonial policy that was suspicious of Western influence. In the words of Lui Tuck Yew, then Minister of State for Education, ‘some may view the ability to speak good English primarily as a pragmatic skill that will confer us an advantage in transactions and dealings, prized for its functional or utilitarian value. This is a perception that we ought to change’ (2007). Lui then states that it is important to reach out to all Singaporeans, especially the younger generation who should be given

the tools to express their emotions, to articulate how they feel, to build and strengthen relationships and establish deeper and more meaningful bonds. To sink deep roots, the English language needs to mean much more to our youth than just a necessity for their education, a skill to help them navigate business and work or to convey instructions to get a job done. (Lui 2007)

According to an advertisement for the 2007 SGEM, ‘Rock Your World! Express Yourself’, a series of events was held in that year to encourage the youth to creatively and spontaneously express themselves in SSE. Organized in collaboration with STOMP! (a citizen-led journalism website) and 98.7FM (an English popular music station), weekly programmes were held at Timbre Music Bistro, a grunge venue where local acoustic bands play live Indie music, during which young people could ‘showcase the use of good English through music and performance art’ (Speak Good English Movement 2007). Just as the 2007 SGEM uses alternative music to associate SSE with nonconformity, so too does an article published in The Straits Times on 21 September 2009 portray SSE as a self- assertive language. In ‘Keeping Singlish at bay’, John Lui describes his feelings of being ostracized by his Singlish-speaking colleagues, especially Julia—‘the alpha male, the leader of the pack, the loudest of the loud’, who maintained Singlish as the dominant language of the workplace (Lui 2009, par. 10). Eventually, the oppressed ‘outcast’ (par. 24) sought advice from the SGEM chairman, who said: ‘If you want to belong to the in-group you will succumb. But it means giving up your identity to be an anonymous digit in a larger group’ (par. 21). The intelligent writer self-consciously emphasizes his SGEM prescriptivism by calling himself a ‘sheriff’ who would ‘send some grammar bandits to jail. Sorry, gaol’ (par. 9). He finally succumbs to speaking Singlish when he eats and socializes with fellow Singaporeans— ‘Be the you that you want to be, even if it means being an outcast. But if you see Julia coming, make a temporary surrender. Good English is nice, but lunchtime is a meal’. Using the stereotypical reference to Singaporeans' love of eating, Lui concedes that Singlish is an irresistible cultural force. But ultimately he defends the official language policy by reversing mainstream views about the controlling government and Singlish identity – by allying SSE with identity instead and associating educated Singlish speakers with social conformism and sociolinguistic engineering and the elitism that Julia attributes to those who do not and will not speak it. Julia is caricatured as an intolerant grammar Nazi who turns the workplace into ‘stalag From Instrumentality to Identity…in Singapore Standard English JEREMY LIM 6

Julia’, where SSE speakers are bullied by activists into carefully distinguishing between the Singlish particles, ‘nor’, ‘nuu’ and ‘nah’ (par. 15). Likewise, a feature article published on 25 October 2010 presents an SSE that is aware of local linguistic realities and that reconciles self-expression with standards. In ‘How I came to love the English language’, Eisen Teo reminisces about his high school English teacher, William Grosse. Grosse is portrayed as a passionate civil servant who taught SSE in creative ways. Teo reiterates Grosse’s description of SSE as a ‘wondrous beast’ (par. 9)—‘not a monster to be feared’ (par. 3). Teo praises his method of coaxing ‘lovely yarns’ out of ‘disjointed sentences’ when he made spider web messages out of toilet paper to teach Charlotte’s Web (par. 11). In the environment that Grosse’s lively classroom exemplifies, SSE is neither the stuttering of the late 1990s nor simply the instrumentality of the postcolonial era. It is acquired in a pedagogically rigorous environment where an expatriate teacher, coolly aware of politically-charged distinctions between SSE and Singlish, makes room for an intelligible form to grow out of the vernacular.

Conclusion

To summarize, this essay has traced the roots of instrumental SSE back to the early nation- building era, when the government maintained a race-neutral language. During the industrializing phase of Singapore's history, instrumental SSE connected the developing nation to an English-speaking economy. Singlish scholars and activists, who obviously can code-switch and speak SSE proficiently, are themselves indebted to the economically driven language policy. To this Singaporean, the mainstream denigration of SSE discredits the consistency with which the government promotes wealth and equality. And while the Singapore government does have a reputation of being very controlling, it has become more willing to validate an identity SSE that merges a local idiom with the global contemporary.

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