Most parents I know with kids nowadays speak English to their kids at home.
Despite English not being their first langauge most of the time.
It’s understandable, since English is been viewed as the more “prestigious” language compared to the mother tongues.
And people who speak English are ” more superior” than people who don’t.
Bullshit.
What most parents do not realise is that, the English that they are using on their kids are Singlish. Or maybe they might think that they are using Standard English, but trust me, most of the time the Standard English is actually “non-standard English”.
To provide an example, I was waiting for the bus last night on my way home. While waiting at the bus-stop, a mother and daughter combination was seated beside me. The little girl looked probably around 3 or 4 years old. They were making conversation and one of them went something along the lines of ….
G: Why the bus is so slow?
M: Yeah lor…. we waited for so long. 15 mins already.
G: Mummy can we take this bus?
M: No, cannot. That one goes to Hougang. Go look for daddy to come here.
Well, I am sure the above looks like a normal conversation that we overhear in our everyday lives. There doesn’t seem to be any big problem.
I guess that is the main gist of it. We are so used to English like that that we think that it is appropriate.
In fact, a lot of English phrases that we hear in Singapore daily are actually literal translation from Chinese.
For instance, the ever popular phrase,
“Since young ……”
It doesn’t sound wrong, I presume?
That is because we are so used to the way that this phrase rings in our ears.
In fact, in English, the proper way to phrase it is “Since I was young, …..”
Then, how did the phrase “Since young” came about?
I probably first originated from Chinese, since we have this phrase called “从小”. And to further add on to it, another ever popular phrase (which is grammatically wrong”, ” Since young till now”, also orginated from the chinese phrase of ” 从小到大”. Does it ring a bell?
If you use this phrase in English, 从小 and 从小到大 has the same meaning. Since I was young (until now).
Another phrase “buy one for me”. It actually doesn’t really exist in the standard english repertoire. Think 买1个给我。 买 in english is buy. Hence, buy one for me. But, in proper English, the usage will be “get one for me”.
There are a lot of other examples of migratory sentence and phrases. I am not too sure if this is only unique in Singapore but my point is, children who speak english at home doesn’t mean that they will necessary have an advantage all the time.
It is undeniable that they have an advantage in the conversational aspect but grammatically, it is totally a separate issue.
Able to speak English doesnt mean that one will be able to speak “good” english. It might sound like a paradox here but I do think that these 2 issues are separated.
Similarly, being able to speak Japanese, does not mean that I speak good Japanese.
Hi Kittochan,
I, myself am from Austria and can’t speak good English. In fact, I think my English is pretty messed up so I really would have liked it if someone spoke English to me. That way my English remained very average and every time I try to speak English I pronounce everything so badly and I do grammatical mistakes, which I would probably not do if I spoke more English. In my class and school there is hardly one who speaks with his parents in English, that makes it even “more superior” here in Austria. I also think it is great bullshit that anyone would think he is superior just because he speaks English in his family. But in fact it is very helpful to be able to communicate in English, it is not everything and not something incredibly intellectual, but it is at least a beginning.
If you speak English every day, it really could come out that you forget to speak nice English and to express yourself properly. But I think that is risk which you must take in every language. In one more, in others less. I also think it depends with whom you are speaking… For example if I would talk German to my mother she would probably speak very messed up German because it is just not important right now… You can’t speak nice English all the time, can you? I don’t know… I think it is very appropriate that you speak simple English at home or on the street, because you just want someone to understand what you are saying.
Means, that if you want, you should be able to speak good English, but if you forget good English because you get used to the simple, that can’t be very positive.
Comment by coffeandcake — December 12, 2008 @ 8:09 pm
Hi Coffeeandcake,
Thank you for your comment.
English is a language, in fact it is considered the universal language because it is most widely spoken, followed by Spanish and Chinese.
Languages exist to help us to communicate with each other and as time pass, there will definitely lies some different variations of the language.
Similarly, like chinese, there are various dialects that sprung off from the main mother tongue and might not be understood by some others who speaks another varied form of the dialect.
I am not too sure how english is been viewed in western europe, but according to my understanding, most western europeans are able to express proficiency in the language, probably just a few slight accent differences.
However, in this part of the world, English is seem as a more educated form of status quo, ie. if you speak english, it is an equivalent of having a higher form of education and that you are likely to be the “elites”. Of course, I am not saying that everyone here views it this way, but unfortunately, such a viewpoint is still deeply rooted in most people.
One main reason would be that English is associated with the West, Europe and America, more industralised countries with higher standard of living, more looked up to as compared to say chinese, since it originated from China and is still a developing countires (It doesn’t help that the media loves to portray on some of the “unsightly” actions of the chinese).
But of course, these are sterotypes that may probably fade away in another decade or so.
My main point of writing that article, which I realised had not been emphasized was actually that Singaporeans like to emphasize english on their kids (probably bad english) and neglect their mother tongue, which I think is a pity.
Creating an english speaking environment for your kids at home hoping that they will excel in the language but neglecting your mother tongue in the process is a pity I feel.
Indeed, as you had mentioned, the ability to speak English is a huge plus-point because of the number of people that we are able to communicate with, but at the expense of your own mother tongue? That will be an issue to think about.
Comment by kittochan — December 13, 2008 @ 11:38 am
Hi Kittochan,
Thank you for your reply.
Sorry that I didn’t understand what you were trying to explain. Anyways, now I understand it.
Here in Austria almost everyone can speak English and barely one can’t understand it. So most of the people notice if you’re speaking weird English, in fact most of the people will even notice if you are speaking with an accent. So it is just standard that one can speak English. Everyone is even expecting it from you, as they are expecting that you speak your mother language.
It seems really that the situation in Singapore is a lot different. So are there really people who are feeling better than others just because they can speak English?
I think your problem takes part in an even bigger problem. It is this viewpoint that Western countries are associated with this higher standard of living and everyone wants to be like the people in the Western societies and so on… I just think that they are loosing their culture by doing so, and as you emphasized they are suffering the loss of their mother language. Japan is probably one of the greatest examples for a peaceful coexisting of culture and the modern way of life. They have borrowed words from all around the world and incorporated them into their language, but in Japan I think it is a different situation, because most of the Japanese don’t even think about neglecting their mother language. I think they are protecting their culture very well.
I don’t want to neglect my mother language either. Of course, it is a very big advantage to know English, but knowing your mother language will surely be a much bigger advantage.
I think there always has to be a balance between speaking English and your mother language. And, as I mentioned before this balance is expected by almost everyone here in Austria, but here the mother language always has priority. Maybe because most of the Austrians are quite nationalistic…
Comment by coffeeandcake — December 15, 2008 @ 3:44 am