THE USAGE OF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS IN FILMS Tan Su Peng Bachelor of Applied Arts with Honours (Cinematography) 2013 THE USAGE OF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS IN FILMS TAN SU PENG This project is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Applied Arts with Honours (Cinematography) Faculty of Applied and Creative Arts UNIVERSITI MALAYSIA SARAWAK 2013 UNIVERSITI MALAYSIA SARAWAK Please tick Final Year Project Report (√) Masters PhD DECLARATION OF ORIGINAL WORK This declaration is made on the ……………..day of……………..2013. Student’s Declaration: I, TAN SU PENG (Matric No. 28474), Faculty of Applied and Creative Arts), hereby declare that the work entitled THE USAGE OF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS IN FILMS is my original work. I have not copied from any other students’ work or from any other sources except where due reference or acknowledgement is made explicitly in the text, nor has any part been written for me by another person. ____________________ ________________________ Date submitted Tan Su Peng (28474) Supervisor’s Declaration: I, YOW CHONG LEE, hereby certifies that the work entitled THE USAGE OF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES AND DIALECT IN FILMS was prepared by the above named student, and was submitted to the “FACULTY OF APPLIED AND CREATIVE ARTS” as a partial fulfillment for the conferment of BACHELOR OF APPLIED ARTS WITH HONOURS, and the aforementioned work, to the best of my knowledge, is the said student’s work. Received for examination by: _____________________ Date: ____________________ YOW CHONG LEE I declare that Project/Thesis is classified as (Please tick (√)): CONFIDENTIAL (Contains confidential information under the Official Secret Act 1972)* RESTRICTED (Contains restricted information as specified by the organisation where research was done)* √ OPEN ACCESS Validation of Project/Thesis I therefore duly affirm with free consent and willingly declare that this said Project/Thesis shall be placed officially in the Centre for Academic Information Services with the abiding interest and rights as follows: • This Project/Thesis is the sole legal property of Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS). • The Centre for Academic Information Services has the lawful right to make copies for the purpose of academic and research only and not for other purpose. • The Centre for Academic Information Services has the lawful right to digitalise the content for the Local Content Database. • The Centre for Academic Information Services has the lawful right to make copies of the Project/Thesis for academic exchange between Higher Learning Institute. • No dispute or any claim shall arise from the student itself neither third party on this Project/Thesis once it becomes the sole property of UNIMAS. • This Project/Thesis or any material, data and information related to it shall not be distributed, published or disclosed to any party by the student except with UNIMAS permission. Student signature ________________________ Supervisor signature: ____________________ (Tan Su Peng) (Yow Chong Lee) Current Address: Faculty of Applied and Creative Arts, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, 94300 Kota Samarahan, Sarawak Notes: * If the Project/Thesis is CONFIDENTIAL or RESTRICTED, please attach together as annexure a letter from the organisation with the period and reasons of confidentiality and restriction. [The instrument is duly prepared by The Centre for Academic Information Services] ! The project entitled “THE USAGE OF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS IN FILMS” was prepared by Tan Su Peng and submitted to the Faculty of Applied and Creative Arts in partial fulfilment of the requirements for a Bachelor of Applied Arts with Honours (Cinematography). Received for examination by: ______________________ Yow Chong Lee Date: ______________________ ! ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In this research, I would like to thank several people. First, I would like to thank my thesis adviser, Mr. Yow Chong Lee for his patience, motivation, and guidance to this research. Besides, I would like to thank my parents, Tan Kui Hong and Chia Pee Sian for the support in financial aspect as well as for the advices and assistances. Last but not least, I also wish to thank to my course mates and everyone who had giving their helps to this research. iv# TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv. TABLE OF CONTENTS v. ABSTRAK/ABTRACT vii. CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.0 Introduction 1 1.1 Problem Statement 5 1.2 Research Objectives 6 1.3 Research Questions 7 1.4 Project Scope 7 1.5 Hypothesis 8 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.0 Literature Review 9 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 3.0 Methodology 16 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS 4.0 Findings 24 4.1 Survey Research 24 4.2 Content Analysis 29 4.2.1 Film Analysis on I Not Stupid Too (2006) 29 4.2.2 Film Analysis on Woohoo (2010) 31 CHAPTER 5: FINAL YEAR PROJECT 5.0 Final Year Project 34 v# 5.1 Synopsis 35 5.2 Discussion on the script in “Forced” 35 5.3 Analysis on the dialogue in “Forced” 37 CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION 6.0 Conclusion 39 REFERENCES 41 APPENDICES Appendix 1 - Questionnaire 44 Appendix 2 - Findings for Questionnaire (Section B) 46 Appendix 3 - Character Breakdown 49 Appendix 4 - Script 50 Appendix 5 - DVD 60 vi# ABSTRAK THE USAGE OF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS IN FILMS Tan Su Peng Kajian ini berkaitan dengan penggunaan pelbagai bahasa dan dialek dalam filem. Objektif kajian ini ialah mengkaji keberkesanan penggunaan bahasa termasuk dialek dalam dialog yang dapat difahami dan diterima umum. Hasil kajian mendapati penggunaan pelbagai bahasa seperti Bahasa Cina, Bahasa Inggeris, Bahasa Melayu dan dialek seperti Bahasa Hokkien dapat membantu penonton mengenali budaya sesuatu tempat. Hasil kajian ini telah diaplikasikan dalam filem pendek yang berjudul, 武鬥 “Forced”. vii# ABSTRACT THE USAGE OF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS IN FILMS Tan Su Peng This research aims to identify the usage of multiple languages and dialects in films. The objective of this research is to investigate the effectiveness of the usage of languages including dialects in the dialogues that can be understood and accepted. This research found that the usage of multiple languages (Chinese, English, and Malay) and dialect (Hokkien) could help the audience to identify the cultural of certain place. This research has been applied in a short film entitled, 武鬥 “Forced”. viii# CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.0 Introduction Malaysia and Singapore are multiracial, multicultural, and multireligious countries since centuries ago. They are very special and unique countries in Asia as the citizen can accept each other and living in a harmonic society although they come from different backgrounds with their own languages. Based on Oxford Dictionaries, Chinese means “a native or inhabitant of China, or a person of Chinese descent, or the language of China”. (Chinese, n.d.). This ethnic can be related to China or its people, culture or language. They have the significance in their lifestyle and languages, which is different from the other ethnics. The migration of the Chinese to Malaya can be traced back to eighteenth and nineteenth century or even further. “In earlier time most of the Chinese migrants had been traders or shopkeepers, but now there was a growing emphasis on miners and agriculturalists. (Andaya.B.W & Andaya.L.Y, 1982: 97). The Chinese in Malaya comes from different states in China such as Fujian, Guangdong, Teochew, Henghua, Foochow and many more. At the very beginning, they came to Malaya as traders and shopkeepers. However, most the migrants of Chinese to Malaysia were became the miners and agriculturalists during 1980s. ! 1! According to Natesan, “the major reason for the Chinese emigration is because starvation, war and political corruption in mainland China.” (Natesan, 2013). They migrated to other places like Malaya was to escape the life of grinding poverty in China and searching for the wealth in other places during the wars. During that time, they served as coolies and work for the British government. Due to the migration of the Chinese, the Chinese culture had been brought along when they came to this new society. As they come from different provinces in China, different types of Chinese cultures, languages, and dialects have been introduced in Malaya to the others races. Nowadays, most of the Chinese still maintaining and preserving their own cultures and languages through many activities such as “ Ai FM is the radio station which airs news in Teo Chew, Hakka, Cantonese and Hokkien daily”. (Ng, 2010). This is a way to learn different types of dialect through the news announced by the radio station. In film industry, there are filmmakers who used different types of languages such as Mandarin, English, Malay, and dialects (Hokkien, Cantonese, and so on.) in the films such as Sepet (2005) by Yasmin Ahmad and Spinning Gasing (2002) by Teck Tan. “The films used different ethnic languages such as Malay, Cantonese, Hokkien, Mandarin and English to correctly capture a slice of real Malaysian life as opposed to a glossed-over version favoured by certain bureaucrats”. (Wee, 2006: 6). This is a good phenomenon in the film industry. The Chinese filmmakers, Chiu Keng Guan and Jack Neo have used different types of languages in their films, such as Great Day (2011), Woohoo (2010), and I Not Stupid Too (2006). Both of them have inserted the local languages and dialects, which ! 2! can represent the society of the country into their films. Hence, their films can be considered as local films, which the stories are based on the local society and cultures. Their films may not be well received or hit the box office outside the countries, but it is a good opportunity to promote Malaysia and Singapore’s cultures to the other countries. Vernacular languages (dialects) play an important role in the Chinese films in both Malaysia and Singapore. As in Oxford Dictionaries, dialect means, “a particular form of a language which is peculiar to a specific region or social group.” (Dialect, n.d.).