Linguistic Situation in Malaysia
Historically, the first European language that came to Malaysia was Portuguese, and this was followed by English, with the British colonization. During this period, Chinese and Indian languages also set foot with the migration of Chinese and Indians to Malaysia. This, in fact,contributed in no small measure to Malaysia’s growth as a multilingual country. As a British colony, the use of English occupied several formal and informal domains. The use of English spread rapidly moulding an elite group of local users among the Malays, Chinese and Indians. This helped increase the number of English speakers. At the same time it was also noted that English medium schools in Malaysia was on the rise linked likely to the increasing popularity of the language. However, after independence, the English language declined in importance as the language in education. The Constitution of Malaya formally declared Bahasa Malaysia (BM) to be the national and official language of Malaysia. BM was the medium of instruction to be used in national schools and an exclusively BM medium public university called National University of Malaysia was established in 1970. However, other minority and indigenous languages continued to be used obviating issues of language conflict. The Chinese and Tamil vernacular4 primary schools were constitutionally allowed to continue with their respective ethnic languages as the medium of instruction. By the mid 1990s, tremendous changes further impacted language choice in education. A milestone change is the green light given by the government to start teaching science subjects in English at tertiary education (Ridge, 2004). In addition, the then Prime Minister Tun Dr.Mahathir Mohamad made it public in 2002 that mathematics and science would henceforth be taught in English. Generally, it set the direction towards a greater emphasis on Malays becoming bilingual (with BM and English) and non-Malays to be trilingual or multilingual (with BM,English and their respective ethnic language).
Linguistic Situation in MalaysiaHistorically, the first European language that came to Malaysia was Portuguese, and this was followed by English, with the British colonization. During this period, Chinese and Indian languages also set foot with the migration of Chinese and Indians to Malaysia. This, in fact,contributed in no small measure to Malaysia’s growth as a multilingual country. As a British colony, the use of English occupied several formal and informal domains. The use of English spread rapidly moulding an elite group of local users among the Malays, Chinese and Indians. This helped increase the number of English speakers. At the same time it was also noted that English medium schools in Malaysia was on the rise linked likely to the increasing popularity of the language. However, after independence, the English language declined in importance as the language in education. The Constitution of Malaya formally declared Bahasa Malaysia (BM) to be the national and official language of Malaysia. BM was the medium of instruction to be used in national schools and an exclusively BM medium public university called National University of Malaysia was established in 1970. However, other minority and indigenous languages continued to be used obviating issues of language conflict. The Chinese and Tamil vernacular4 primary schools were constitutionally allowed to continue with their respective ethnic languages as the medium of instruction. By the mid 1990s, tremendous changes further impacted language choice in education. A milestone change is the green light given by the government to start teaching science subjects in English at tertiary education (Ridge, 2004). In addition, the then Prime Minister Tun Dr.Mahathir Mohamad made it public in 2002 that mathematics and science would henceforth be taught in English. Generally, it set the direction towards a greater emphasis on Malays becoming bilingual (with BM and English) and non-Malays to be trilingual or multilingual (with BM,English and their respective ethnic language).
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