1.

0 INTRODUCTION

English language was first stressed in our country through the means of communication
and slowly making its way into our education system. The first venture of British influence on
education in Malaysia can be dated back to 1816 and the real exposure was really with the re-
position of the Malay States to the Colonial Office in London in 1867 that the British stresses
much importance to education. During the colonial times English was used as a mean for socio-
economic mobility and education enhancement (Venugopal, 2000). After reaching
independence the role of English took a turn becoming not only a tool of international socio-
political correspondence and involvement, but also as a global medium of interaction and
knowledge exchange. The varieties of English are many, it is essential that in the global
framework, it extends from native varieties to non-native varieties. L1 type, which is referred
to as the native variety, is the one English speakers use.

Stevenson (1975) says that the British appreciated the value of educational planning and policy:

The Englishmen who ruled over the Malay States at this time had a most healthy respect for
the potential of education as a socio-political catalyst.... The first thirty years of British rule in
the Malay States saw the establishment of an educational system and the definition of an
educational policy, the outline and contents of which were to remain basically the same
throughout the greater part of their administration in this century.

Malaysian English is the outcome of mixed up processes such as simplification,

acculturation and generalization by the public, making it distinctively Malaysian. In all
Malaysian learning institutions, the usage of Standard English is emphasized. However, the
speakers have adopted the language to accommodate their own suitability when it comes to
communicating. Some Malaysian English-speaking people use the informal approach when
writing to family and friends. Malaysian English due to its British origins shares many
characteristics of the British English but has also elements of local language adaptation in its
vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar. Malaysia English has variation of gradually moving
towards simplicity in its pronunciation and grammar with other types of English. This requires
studying English as a cultural form that moves, changes and is reused in a Malaysian context
(Pennycook, 2007: 6) because nativised varieties incorporate features from the native
languages in phonology, morphology, syntax, lexis and pragmatics that are consistent and fixed
that users follow (McArthur, 1998; Trudgill & Hannah, 2002). Therefore some regard this
variety as a deviation from the parent language resulting in fossilization (Selinker, 1972). On
the other hand, there are also scholars who disprove this notion. Sridhar (1983:52-53) defends
it by saying that it is the process of ‘accommodation of an alien code in the usage of social-
cultural context’.

In Malaysia, the reliability on the use of English as second language is still present and
is an important aspect of our daily lives. Irrefutably, Malaysia still embraces Standard British
English as the pedagogical model (Gill; 19: 1994). Nonetheless, there is a tendency to assume
the growth of Malaysian English as something not to be proud of and a lower level than the
British English. As Malaysian English speakers and socio-political state are bilingual in nature,
this need not be the case. Therefore, the use of ME would produce different outcomes than the
English used by the native British speakers. Even though bilingualism promotes a sense of
esteem and pride in cultures and languages learnt (Ovando and Collier; 2:1985), still it may
involve equal competency or unequal competency (Rosli Talif and Ain Nadzimah; 201: 2000)
among its speakers. The usage of English varies according to place and environment as people
from a background of living in town would have acquire a much higher level of command in
English than in village background. This is mainly in respect to their sociocultural settings
where people are comfortable in their own English-speaking environment.

1.1 THE EXTENSIVE USE OF MALAYSIAN ENGLISH

The Malaysian English usage is not confined to learning institutions but are wide spread
throughout the nation and can be used among friends in social intercourse and also in
transactions both official and non-official, among government bodies (Wong & Thambyrajah,
1991). Malaysian now are getting much more comfortable using the Malaysian English as an
effective mean of communication because it simply displays much more ease of usage and
reduction of a non-native variety as well as the effects of localization of an acculturated variety.
Henceforth, Malaysian English rises as an informal lingua-franca among Malaysian that
stresses the importance of English for work and educational purpose neglecting the social
needs. The higher the number of Malaysian speaking the Malaysian English the higher the
amount of interference form the Mother Tongue can be found. Furthermore, Rosli and Ting Su
Hie (63;1999), specified that code or language switching among Malaysian English speakers
are of a collective incidence. Code switching refers to a verbal strategy employed by bilingual
or bidialectal speakers through the change of linguist codes within a similar speech event as a
sign of cultural solidarity or distance (Kramsch; 125: 1998).

1.2 PHONOLOGY, PHOENETICS & VOWELS

Phonology is the component of language that is concerned with the rules governing the
structure, distribution and sequencing of speech sounds and the shape of syllables (Owens,
2007). It is considered as one of the main components of language, alongside morphology,
syntax, semantics and pragmatics. Phonology has two elements: overt and covert speech
(Edwards & Shriberg, 1983). Since Malaysian English and the ‘protolanguage’ has the same
structure of having a phonology and a semantic element but deficit in grammatical or lexical
element, the survival of ‘protolanguage’ among growing children in Malaysia is slowly being
left out. There main reason for this would be the language’s limited role as a resource for
learning. Malaysian English would end up the same way if no immediate actions being taken
in restructuring the language. To learn more on the phoenetic environment, bVd words
provided a uniform results and minimised co-articulatory effects on the vowel quality. It also
made it easier to identify the vowel segment on the spectrogram. All the words were familiar
to the subjects.

As researched by Pillai and Salaemae (2012: 1148), there is no standard word list used
to examine vowel quality with different researchers using different CVC contexts. More
distressing is that such reverence for native models is inconsistent with the way in which many
ME users establish a local identity via English and take ownership of English as their own, be
they L1 or dominant or L2 users of Malaysian English. Although Malay was rendered national
language status (Article 152 of the Federal Constitution and the National Language Act
1963/196), at the early stages of the post-colonial period, English was as important as it is
having strong influence on education and administration and spoken British English was given
much importance. At the same time, a more locally flavoured English was developing and is
captured in literary and creative works written in English (e.g. Killingley 1968: 185-205), and
has also been described in previous research. However, by the early 1970s, Malay began
replacing English as the medium of instruction in national schools and public universities. It
can be assumed that with the decrease in use of English in more formal contexts, like
administration and education, the use of the nativised or localised variety of English became
more widespread, which would place Malaysian English at phase 3 of the model. At this phase,
there will be variability in pronunciation as the features have yet to stabilise, and the emerging
features of pronunciation are likely to be “transfer phenomena from the phonology of
indigenous languages” (Schneider, 2003).

Apart from that, Malaysian English vowels differ in quality to the equivalent vowels in
the Received Pronunciation (RP) of British English. These include the vowel /a/ such as in the
word start, being produced further front and shorter as [a] (Baskaran, 2004). Apart from,
vowels, other general structures of pronunciation described are the use of syllable initial dental
‘th’ sounds being replaced by /t/ and /d/ (e.g. in three and mother respectively), the deletion of
the final consonant (particularly alveolar stops) in word final consonant groups, such as in
words like just and behind (Phoon and Maclagan 2009: 63-64; Platt and Weber 1980: 170-
172). Other structures of Malaysian English pronunciation described by Phoon and Maclagan
(2009: 63-64) and by Baskaran (2004: 1041-1042) comprise the devoicing of final fricatives
such as in the words give and eyes [gɪf] instead of [gɪv], [aɪs] instead of [aɪz]) and the utilisation
of final stops (e.g. in that). Phoon and Maclagan (2009: 64) also found instances of rhoticity
among their respondents. However, as Schneider points out, requires a “psychological
independence and the acceptance of a new, indigenous identity” (2003: 250), but due to the
multilingual context of Malaysia, the geographical spread, and socio-politically related
language issues, this is a complex ideal to attain. Because of the dependence on exonormativity
standards, and the reduced functional use of English, Schneider suggests that English in
Malaysia is currently at phase 3, while neighbouring Singapore is placed at phase 4 (2003: 260-
263). Other factor that needs to be taken into account before relegating Malaysian English to
phase 3 is that many Malaysian English speakers can glide in and out of colloquial and
acrolectal varieties of Malaysian English, often changing their pronunciation as well. Thus, it
may be the case that Malaysian English is actually in between phase 3 and 4, that is, there is
still variability in some aspects of pronunciation, but others, such as the lack of quality contrast
between some vowel pairs and the monophthongisation of some diphthongs are rather stable
features among Malaysian English speakers.
1.3 CONCLUSION

As for conclusion, it is good to have our own English accent as it gives the originality
to our country. Malaysians are known for their English accent which makes them differ from
others. It is never wrong to have our own accent as it gives an identity to us. When there can
be formal recognition of American English, Australian English and Canadian English,
Malaysian English deserves the recognition too. The best example can be seen from Tun Dr
Mahathir Mohamed, the former prime minister of Malaysia. The former prime minister of
Malaysia speaks like a true blue Malay who ignores completely the British accent. His English
is still considered excellent. Therefore, there is nothing wrong practising our own English
accent. Standard English has no relation with pronunciation. With Malay as an operational
national language and with many other competing local languages, English in Malaysia has
undergone a different strand of development compared to Singapore English. Analysis of
colloquial or learner varieties of Malaysian English alone is not enough to determine the
development of Malaysian English as features in Malaysian English as an L1 and the acrolectal
variety also need to be taken into account. Standard British English varies according to country.
It refers only to the syntax of spoken and written English. The stability of a Standard English
is one of the added advantages. It can be implemented and has been implemented in many years
throughout the English speaking world. However, British English standard is even crucial to
be learnt as it provides its own significance in many ways. For example, there will be no any
problems while communicating with the foreign expertise. Since a Standard English is being
used, it is easy for both parties to converse and form a conclusion. English is considered an
international language, thus it should not be a problem for ones to use English as their main
language to converse. Other importance of using a British English is that we will not face
difficulties when we work abroad especially in countries such as Antigua, Barbuda, Barbados,
Belize and many more who uses British English as their second language to communicate. The
chances of being appointed for a job in a foreign country are even brighter when we can
converse well in British Standard English. Besides, a standard British English is important
because it shows the professionalism while conversing with people from other countries.
Therefore, Standard English and Standard British English have their own added advantages
and there is nothing wrong but something that need to be proud of.
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