BASIC DATA

Official Country

Name:

Republic of

Singapore

Region: Southeast Asia

Population: 4,151,264

Language(s): Chinese, Malay,

Tamil, English

Literacy Rate: 91.1%

Number of Primary

Schools: 198

Compulsory

Schooling: 6 years

Public Expenditure

on Education: 3.0%

Educational

Enrollment: Primary: 269,668

Secondary:

205,683

Higher: 92,140

Educational

Enrollment Rate: Primary: 94%

Secondary: 74%

Teachers: Primary: 10,618

Higher: 6,689

Student-Teacher

Ratio: Primary: 25:1

Secondary: 20:1

Female Enrollment

Rate: Primary: 93%

Jan 1, 1950

Survival Driven Education

During the 1950s and 1960s, when

Singapore started to develop its own

economy, Singapore adapted a "survival-

driven education" system to provide a

skilled workforce for Singapore's

industrialization programme as well to as

to lower unemployment.Apart from being

an economic necessity, education also

helped to integrate the new nation

together.

Jan 1, 1960

Starting Bilingualism

The bilingualism policy in schools was

officially introduced in 1960, making

English the official language for both

national integration and utilitarian

purposes.Universal education for children

of all races and background started to

take shape, and more children started to

attend schools.However, the quality of

schools set up during this time varied

considerably.

Jan 1, 1979
The Goh Report: From Quantity to

Quality

From 1979, Singapore's economy started

to prosper, and the focus of Singapore's

education system shifted from quantity to

quality. More differentiation for pupils

with different academic abilities were

implemented, such as revamping

vocational education under the new

Institute of Technology and splitting of

the Normal stream in secondary schools

into Normal (Academic) and Normal

(Technical) streams.The Gifted Education

Programme was also set up to cater to

more academically inclined students

Jan 1, 1997

Thinking Schools, Learning Nation

In 1997, the Singapore education system

started to change into an ability-driven

one after then Prime Minister Goh Chok

Tong outlined his "Thinking Schools,

Learning Nations" vision. Under this

policy, more emphasis was given to

national education, creative thinking,

collaborative learning as well as ICT

literacy. Schools became more diverse

and were given greater autonomy in

deciding their own curriculum and

developing their own niche areas.

Jan 1, 2003

Innovation and Enterprise

Nurturing a spirit of Innovation and

Enterprise (I&E) will build up a core set

of life skills and attitudes that we want in

our students. It promotes the mindsets

that we want to see in our students,

teacher, school leaders and beyond.

Jan 1, 2005

Teach Less Learn More

MOE TLLM website Teach Less, Learn

More is about teaching better, to engage

our learners and prepare them for life,

rather than teaching more, for tests and

examinations. TLLM aims to touch the

hearts and engage the minds of our

learners, to prepare them for life. It

reaches into the core of education - why

we teach, what we teach and how we

teach.

Singapore is a linguistically and ethnically

diverse country with a population of about 5

million. [4]

Officially, its ethnic composition is approximately

76.8% Chinese, 13.9% Malay, 7.9% Indian, while

the remaining 1.4% are mainly Others, a

miscellaneous category. [5]

Given this diversity, the language policy in

Singapore aims at cultivating amongst its

citizens a bilingual proficiency in the English

language and a mother tongue that is officially

assigned to the specific ethnic communities.

Although the English language is excluded from

the list of official mother tongues (Mandarin,

Bahasa Melayu, Tamil), it is still recognised as

an official language for practical reasons such as

ensuring socio-economic mobility. This is

because the ethnically neutral status of English

helps to ensure that the distribution of economic

advantages is not seen as unduly privileging or

benefiting a specific ethnic group, which would

otherwise raise the danger of inter-ethnic

tension. Additionally, the English language

represents the idea of 'modernity' and its

association with progress, science, technology

and capitalism. [6]

Motivations of Language

Policies

After political independence in 1959, the

Singapore Government officially accepted Malay

as the national Language of Singapore. However,

its importance gradually declined as a result of

the social, political and economic developments

that had taken place. When vernacular schools

were closed in 1987, the Ministry of Education

implemented the National System of

Education. [7]

The Bilingual Policy encourages Singaporeans to

be proficient in both the English language, and in

their respective ethnic mother tongues , which

include Chinese Mandarin , Malay, and Tamil.

Bilingual education is provided by the Ministry of

Education in Singapore.

The Bilingual Policy also aims to promote better

understanding amongst the three ethnic groups

in line with the effort of nation building.

Additionally, there was also the growing concern

that Singapore was facing increasing Western

influences, effecting a potential threat of the de-

Asianisation or de-culturalisation of the people.

Due to the increasing importance of English as

an international language, many Singaporeans

have started to pay more attention to the

learning of the English language and focus less

on the learning of their own mother tongue. The

Bilingual Policy was then enacted to safeguard

Asian identities and values. Alongside English,

the Singapore Government aims to promote

Mandarin Chinese, Malay and Tamil so as to

prevent the erosion of culture and heritage of the

three ethnic groups [7]

Racial harmony is a stated policy of the

Singaporean government , and a racial harmony

day is even celebrated. [8] Usage of four official

languages is an element of policy designed to

promote racial harmony, as is bilingualism in

accordance with the belief that the ethnic

language is the "carrier of culture" while English

is the "language of commerce", a choice

motivated by the fact that English had

historically been the language of the colonial

administration, while being the native language

of few Singaporeans at the time of the policy's

implementation. [9] With English as the lingua

franca , no one ethnicity is favored, but the

cultures are preserved. The idea behind this

policy is that treating all languages as standard

and thus equally prestigious will result in the

speakers of each language being treated

equally. [10]

While the Singaporean government promotes

Standard Singapore English as a lingua franca , it

heavily discourages the usage of Singlish , a

Chinese- and Malay-influenced, English-based

creole language , [11][12] widely spoken by

Singaporeans, but virtually unintelligible to

foreign speakers of English. Governments

including those of Lee Hsien Loong , Lee Kuan

Yew, and Goh Chok Tong have campaigned

against the usage of Singlish, [13] declaring it an

obstacle to communication with the rest of the

English-speaking world, and a substandard,

"broken English", [14] that ought not be part of

Singapore's identity. [15] A Speak Good English

campaign aims "to encourage Singaporeans to

speak grammatically correct English that is

universally understood", [16] while urging citizens

to purge Singlish from their speech. [17] In line

with government policy, schools emphasize

standard English, and try to minimize the usage

of Singlish in the classroom, holding that

Singlish hinders the learning of "proper"

English. [18][19] The Media Development

Authority, a statutory board of the government,

urges Singaporean mass media to use as little

Singlish as possible, declaring it appropriate only

for "interviews, where the interviewee speaks

only Singlish". [20] Despite these policies,

however, the usage of Singlish outside formal,

institutional contexts remains widespread.

The Singaporean government also promotes a

single, standardized form of Chinese,

discouraging the usage of dialects. While the

Chinese community of Singapore historically

spoke several varieties of Chinese, most of them

mutually unintelligible, [21][22] such as

Cantonese , Teochew , and Hokkien , the

government has promoted Standard Mandarin ,

both as a means of unifying Chinese

Singaporeans under a common language, and to

facilitate communication with Chinese people

from outside Singapore. Since 1979, the Speak

Mandarin Campaign has promoted use of

Mandarin. [ citation needed ]

Language Ideology

There were two prominent language ideologies

that the Singapore government adopted:

Internationalization

It entails the adoption of a non-

indigenous language as an official

language . The Singapore government

adopted a non-indigenous language,

English, to exist alongside the

indigenous languages of Singapore.

Linguistic Pluralism

It entails a recognition and support of

the co-existence of multiple languages

within society.

Some believe it to be in contrast with

the language ideology of linguistic

assimilation, where every member of

the speech community , regardless of

his first language , must learn the

dominant language of the society where

he lives in. [2]

After independence, the Singapore government

gave English Language, Mandarin Chinese, Malay

Language and Tamil Language shared official

status. [2]

The Singapore government attempts to shun

away from linguistic assimilation, as it believes it

must acknowledge the need to embrace the co-

existence of the four official languages in the

context of a multi-racial Singapore.

Status Planning

Status Planning suggests that a particular

language or variety may be chosen for specific

purposes and given official status. This may

result in a language policy which is a product of

language planning, and can be comprehended

within the discourse of language politics and

society, or the more informal but powerful

political and social aspects of language

planning. In this view, one can argue that

language status planning issues are related to

political issues as status planning focuses on

legislative decisions that affect the reallocation

of language functions. [23] Language status can

also mean the position or standing of a

language vis-à-vis other languages. [24]

The Singapore Government recognises the

importance of the English language for a multi-

racial society and therefore it has been attributed

the status of an official language and a de facto

national language . The government has been

active in promoting status planning in Singapore.

One of the most distinct changes in the

linguistic landscape of Singapore after

independence was promoting the status of the

English language. This is done by allocating

resources to develop English in various

functional domains such as the government, law,

business, administration, and in particular, the

medium of instruction in schools—even though

time is allocated for the learning of Mother

tongue languages.

English is the international lingua franca , it was

no longer viewed as a colonial language but

rather an international language permitting

universal communication. The economic rewards

of being proficient in English was emphasised

upon perpetuating the mindset that English is

the superior language in Singapore. [25] Besides

government administrative domains where

English is widely practised, English has gradually

been inculcated into social, family and individual

habitats as well. Despite the government's

attempt to maintain symbolic and cultural capital

in the Mother tongues , English has been deeply

integrated into the local linguistic landscape of

Singapore. [26]

It is evident that English has acquired a

significant role in the linguistic landscape of

Singapore, as Singapore is the only (non-native

speaker) country which has adopted English as a

working language, short of Singapore, no other

country has channelled its language policies into

churning out a population that is bi-literate in

English and another official language. [6]

Speak Good English Movement

(SGEM)

Main article: Speak Good English Movement

The Speak Good English Movement is a

government-initiated campaign[27] which aims

"to encourage Singaporeans to speak

grammatically correct English that is universally

understood". [28]

The Singapore government sees Singlish as a

variety whose increasing popularity might

threaten the ability of Singaporeans to acquire

competence in 'good' English. The latter is

prized as a linguistic resource in a world of

global economic competition, and the

government fears that the presence of Singlish

might actually undermine English language

proficiency. This led the government, in 2000, to

initiate the Speak Good English Movement

(SGEM). [29]

On 15 August 1999, The Sunday Times reported

Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore's first Prime Minister,

commented on Singlish as a 'handicap':

Controversy of the campaign

While the Speak Good English Movement has

seen progress through its engagement via radio

shows, on television programmes, and in giving

out the 'Inspiring Teacher of English' award, [31] it

has controversy as well. Despite the

government's label of Singlish as a 'handicap',

the latter endorsed the usage of Singlish on

more than one occasion.

SARS crisis

When the SARS crisis broke out in 2003, the

Singapore government commissioned a SARS

rap song (sometimes known as the "SAR-vivor

Rap") to emphasise the importance of proper

hygiene. [29] The lyrics of the SARS rap song are

heavily Singlish, containing terms such as "lah",

"leh", and "kiasu". [32]

To answer its contradictory stance, the

Singapore government provided a rationale that

"Singlish was considered necessary in order to

communicate with less-educated

Singaporeans". [29]

Singapore Day

Singapore Day is a cultural-cum- cuisine -based

event organised by the Prime Minister's Office

Overseas Singaporean Unit. It is aimed at

engaging Singaporeans residing overseas. It is

held in different cities with a significant

community of overseas Singaporeans.

According to a report by The Sunday Times on

26 April 2009, the event made occasional use of

Singlish, such as the lexical item 'chope', which

is used to indicate the reservation of a seat. [29]

The intended audience there is not the 'less-

educated', since most of the overseas

Singaporeans are working professionals or

university students pursuing a degree

abroad. [29]

Acquisition Planning

Acquisition Planning can be defined as the co-

ordination of the language planning goals of the

official parties involved in the implementation

and integration of a language policy to ensure its

timely and cost effective acquisition. [33]

In Singapore, the government has sole control

over the acquisition planning of language. This

form of language planning is often done in line

with status planning. The government aims to

influence aspects of the language, status,

distribution and literacy through the education

system. [34] Acquisition planning is often

incorporated into language planning processes in

which the statuses of languages are

evaluated,corpuses are revised and these

revisions are implemented in society through the

education system. [35]

Curriculum Development Institute

of Singapore

The Curriculum Development Institute of

Singapore (CDIS) was formed in 1980 as a

division under the Ministry of Education. The

institute had the sole task of producing teaching

packages under the syllabuses prepared by the

Curriculum Planning Division. [36] In 1998, the

Ministry of Education recognised a need to

incorporate innovative changes to its Education

system besides the current Bilingual Policy. The

Ministry introduced three important national

initiatives: 1) National Education, 2) Information

Technology and 3) Thinking Skills, to the school

curriculum [7] The Curriculum Planning Division

reduced the content of the existing syllabuses to

integrate the three national initiatives into the

school curriculum.

Bilingual Policy

Under the Bilingual Policy, all students are

educated in English as their first language . The

Ministry of Education ensures that the Bilingual

Policy is met by students in Primary and

Secondary schools- not only are they required to

master English as their first language, they also

have to learn their Mother Tongue as a second

language . [37] They are offered Mandarin

Chinese, Malay or Tamil depending on their

father's ethnicity.

While English is the core language of instruction

in government schools, mother tongue languages

are taught on a weekly basis. While "mother

tongue" typically correlates to the first language

(L1) overseas, in Singapore, the Ministry of

Education refers to it as the "ethnic language" or

the second language (L2). [37] Singapore's

language planning is known as exogenous

planning, whereby a foreign language takes on

the role as the main language of communication

against the indigenous languages in the country.

The education system aims to create a

workforce that is bi-literate in English and

Chinese/Malay/Tamil. [38]

Despite the intentions of the bilingual policy,

there has been an inherent and significant shift

from a predominant use of Mandarin Chinese to

English within the Chinese community. [39] The

1980 Population Census revealed that the use of

Malay Language has dropped from 96.7% to

94.3%. The use of English Language in Malay

households has increased from 2.3% to 5.5%.

Outcome of Bilingual Policy

Report on the Ministry of Education, 1978:

Assessment of Bilingual Policy:

Formed in April 1978 and led by Deputy Prime

Minister, Dr Goh Keng Swee , the Goh Report

assessed the bilingual education programme in

Singapore.The Ministry of Education saw its

Bilingualism policy as not being universally

effective. [37] The Goh Report critiqued the

Bilingual policy as ineffective bilingualism

leading to the main cause of language education

problems in Singapore. [37] Although the

Bilingual policy resulted in a rise in overall

literacy rate, [40] statistics reveal that less than

40% of the School-going Students had the

minimum competency level in two languages at

a time. [37]

Under the review of Singapore’s education

system:

At least 25% of the Primary school cohort did

not meet the minimum criteria for literacy

levels.

Only 11% of the armed force recruits were

adequately competent in English.

97.5% of the Primary 6 students who sat for

the Primary School Leaving Examination

(PSLE) obtained A*-C grades in English.

86.9% of the Secondary 4 students who sat

for the GCE 'O' Level Examinations obtained

A*-C grades in English.

Despite increasing Language exposure time in

the school curriculum, teaching strategies

were ineffective in enhancing Students'

language proficiency.

Challenges and solutions of Bilingual

Policy

An increasing number of Singaporeans are

speaking and using English at home, leading to

declining standards in the command of Mother

Tongue. The impact of the bilingualism policy

however, differs from one ethnic group to

another. [37]

Report on the Ministry of Education (1978):

Assessment of Bilingual policy for three ethnic

groups; The Chinese community, the Malay

Community, the Indian Community

The Chinese community

The Chinese community struggled with learning

two languages; English and Mandarin Chinese .

When Chinese students were exposed to

Mandarin Chinese in school, they felt that the

language was foreign and hard to grasp. The

home context did not favour the learning of

Mandarin Chinese because Chinese dialects;

Hokkien , Teochew , Cantonese, Hainanese, Hakka

were the dominant mode of communication at

home depending on dialectal group. The Ministry

of Education only allowed Mandarin Chinese in

the classroom, Chinese dialects were seen as

inferior in status and were an impediment to

learning Mandarin Chinese. [38]

In light of the difficulties faced by the Chinese

community, the government made several

amendments to the educational system to help

Chinese students cope with acquiring Mandarin

Chinese: [7]

With the introduction of EM3 stream,

Mandarin Chinese and other Primary school

subjects were taught at a lower than

mainstream level to help academically less

inclined students cope with a less demanding

curriculum.

Introduction of Chinese B Mandarin Chinese is

taught at a lower than mainstream level to

help students with difficulties in Mandarin

Chinese still be able to acquire the language

at oral- language proficiency levels.

Establishment of Singapore Centre for Chinese

Language (SCCL) in November 2009. In

recognition of Chinese students who come

from non –Mandarin speaking homes, the

centre aims to enhance the effectiveness of

teaching Chinese as a second language in a

bilingual environment that is conducive to the

needs of these students.

The Speak Mandarin Campaign (SMC) was

organised in 1979 by then Prime Minister Lee

Kuan Yew to promote Chinese Language and

Culture among Chinese Singaporeans.

Essentially this annual event seeks to create

heightened awareness of Singaporean Chinese

Asian heritage.

The Malay Community

Malay is valued as the means for transmitting

familial and religious values. Malay is widely

practised in mosques and religious schools also

known as '’Madrasahs'’. The use of Malay

language has been largely reduced to religious

and classroom domains only. [7] The increase in

the number of contexts of which English is being

practised has resulted in a large proportion of

the Malays assimilating to English.

As a result, the ML 'B' programme was

introduced in 2000 to help less linguistically

inclined students cope with acquiring the Malay

language at oral- language proficiency levels.

However, the ML 'B' programme was available

only at secondary levels and was not offered at

pre-university levels. [7]

The Indian Community

Under the Bilingualism Policy, Singaporean

Indians only had the option of Tamil for their

Mother Tongue. Non-Tamil Indian Students were

thus at a disadvantage. In recognition of this, the

Ministry of Education revised the Bilingual Policy

in 1989 to allow Indian Students to choose

between Bengali , Hindi , Punjabi , Gujarati and

Urdu as their Mother Tongue. [7]

Revisions made to Bilingual Policy

The development and implementation of the

Bilingual Policy is an example of acquisition

planning.The Bilingual policy places excessive

demands on average students. Most students

tackle two foreign languages at primary school

level because most of them speak Chinese

dialects at home and Mandarin Chinese is used

in schools for Chinese lessons. [36] The Ministry

of Education felt that resources were not

effectively employed to meet the goals of the

policy. Therefore, amendments were made to

allow for more flexibility and to cater to the

diverse linguistic needs of the population: [37]

Students who could not cope with the

demands of a Bilingual education could

choose to focus on one language, i.e.,

English.

Students who were linguistically inclined were

encouraged to take on a third language, in

addition to English and their Mother Tongue.

Under this new curriculum, the diverse needs of

the students could be met and they could

effectively maximise their linguistic capabilities.

However, the issue of the lack of command in

English was highlighted again in the "Report for

Moral Education" in 1979. [41]

Corpus Planning

Corpus planning focuses on changes by

deliberate planning to the actual corpus or shape

of a language. It deals with codification , and can

play a significant role in implementation and

elaboration stages. Elaboration can be

considered as a language task resulting in

increased sophistication of the chosen code. [42]

Corpus planning is often undertaken by planners

with great linguistic expertise. [43] Corpus

planning is also referred as making language

planning decisions to engineer changes in the

structure of a language. [44] The Singapore

Government has been active in status planning

and acquisition planning however with regards to

corpus planning in English, nothing has been

done.The government modelled Singaporean

English after Standard British English , without

recognising the internal issues of English which

must be specific to the local context. [45] Due to

the lack of a government body that deals with

language issues such as codification and

purification, there is negligence to local

English, [46] it becomes difficult to ascertain

whether there is a Standard Singapore

English. [47]

With respect to Chinese language, the

government selected Mandarin Chinese as the

variety of Chinese language that takes

precedence over other social and regional

dialects i.e., Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese,

Hainanese, Hakka. [48] Standardization generally

entails increasing the uniformity of the norm, as

well as of the norm. [44] The government

adopted Mandarin Chinese as one of the four

official languages in Singapore and it is

mandatory that the Chinese population in

Singapore learn Mandarin Chinese as their

mother tongue in schools. In addition the

government launched the Speak Mandarin

Campaign to promote the prestige of Mandarin

Chinese against other Chinese dialects.

Speak Mandarin Campaign (SMC)

Main article: Speak Mandarin Campaign

The Speak Mandarin Campaign was launched by

then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew in 1979. The

campaign seeks to encourage the use of

Mandarin and to discourage the use of dialects,

characterising the latter as 'burdens,' as

summarized in Goh Chok Tong's (then First

Deputy Prime Minister ) speech marking the

1986 Speak Mandarin Campaign:

Outcome

The success of the campaign was evident 20

years from the launch of the campaign. The

campaign has significantly reduced the number

of dialect speakers in Singapore. The use of

Chinese dialect at home dropped from 81.4% in

1980 to 30.7% in 2000. Meanwhile, households

that claimed to use Mandarin as the dominant

language at home increased from 10.2% in 1980

to 35% in 2000. [49]

Although the campaign is successful in reducing

the number of dialect speakers in Singapore, it

is not always received positively. This is due to

two key reasons:

The Singapore Government does not abandon

the usage of dialects fully.

Members from other ethnic groups in

Singapore felt that they were not treated fairly.

The reason why Mandarin has been chosen

among the various Chinese dialects is that it is

supposedly able to unite the different dialect

groups, and it is also supposedly the variety

associated with ancient Chinese culture and its

values. [50] This is not to say that the

government considers the dialects to be totally

without cultural value. The government does at

times acknowledge that the dialects are also

capable of conveying traditional Chinese values.

Excerpted from a speech made by then Prime

Minister Goh Chok Tong during the 1991 Speak

Mandarin Campaign:

Non-Mandarin Chinese language speakers have

complained that their children have to study two

foreign languages — English and Mandarin. [39]

This is contrasted to a possible alternative

policy of English and their native language , and

that the emphasis on Mandarin threatens family

ties, as older generations are often not

conversant in Mandarin (unless it is their native

tongue). Some critics include that the Mandarin

education system's goal of promoting cultural

identity has left many younger generations of

Mandarin speakers unable to communicate with

their non-Mandarin Chinese language-speaking

grandparents.

Overview

Singapore's Bilingual Policy has been

commended on contributing to the country's

economic success. [36] The social and political

stability that Singapore has enjoyed all these

years has also been attributed to the Bilingual

policy. [51] There are however, a lot existing

issues and potential problems underlying the

bilingual policy, while the English language was

useful in attaining national cohesion within the

Multi-racial Country, Mandarin Chinese, Malay

Language , Tamil Language have lost their

prestige in the society. To rectify these issues,

the government, the policy makers and the

teaching professions should co-operate with one

another. As front-line practitioners, local teachers

have direct experience on the needs and

difficulties of students. Parents and peers are

invisible planners who have power to determine

the success of the government's language

policy. [6] The collective collaboration of the

government, policy makers, local teachers,

parents and peers more effective and

indigenised language policy can be

designed. [38]

Policy discourse in Singapore has largely

overlooked the fact that the linguistic market

consists of permeable boundaries and the value

of linguistic capital for each language changes

as internal and external factors interact

together. [26] The Ministry of Education was

critiqued as failing to recognise that perceptions

regarding linguistic capital can change, therefore

Language Policy implementation (Bilingual

Policy) need to consider the feelings and

willingness of the recipients as this ultimately

determines the final acceptance and success of

the policy. Language Policy and implementations

need to consider bottom up processes

(Individuals and Unofficial Institutions), and not

just designed from the top (Government and

Official Agencies). [52] The population’s

perceptions regarding prestige and image of

Ethnic Languages are important parameters that

need to be established and analysed in

accordance with the Government’s Language

Policies plans to account for a multicultural

country like Singapore. [53]

The political advantages that English has to offer

cannot be denied. While the bilingual policy

aims to educate its population in enhancing

communication in the international market, it is

also able to protect the cultural identities of the

indigenous groups by embracing

multiculturalism.However, the processes of

globalisation exert increasing pressure on the

population to assimilate towards English at the

expense of their mother tongues . While diversity

breeds potential threats to globalisation, long-

term language planning must be sensitive

enough to tackle the precarious linguistic

situation to protect Mandarin Chinese, Malay and

Tamil, perhaps even Hindi, Punjabi, Gujarati and

Urdu alongside English. [54]

See also

Language planning

Language ideology

Language education in Singapore

Education in Singapore

Ministry of Education (Singapore)

Bilingual Education
Multilingualism

Speak Good English Movement

Speak Mandarin Campaign

Singapore Day

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3. ^ Spolsky, B. (2004). Language policy.

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"Welcome to the MOE Racial Harmony

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Singapore Centre for Chinese Learning

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Language planning and

policy in Singapore

Those Singaporeans who can

speak good English should

help to create a good

environment for speaking

English, rather than advocate,

as some do, the use of

Singlish… Singlish is a

handicap we must not wish on

Singaporeans