Naming practices in Singapore's hawker centres: Echoes of itineracy

A hawker is an itinerant salesperson, formerly typically ubiquitous in most urban environments. Despite the popular and useful services they provide, they are often viewed with suspicion. Starting in the 1960s, the government of Singapore has begun to sedentarise the trade into purpose-built 'hawker centres' that house individual stalls of foods in a covered area fitted with electrical, gas, and water connections as well as seating space and sanitary facilities. This food hygiene drive has resulted in a permanent immobilisation of the hawker trade. This chapter considers the naming practices of 211 hawker stalls in four centres to reveal patterns (in the use of languages, scripts, and geographical references) that challenge the imposed immobility and evoke memories of actual hawking

Bah in Singapore English

Colloquial Singapore English ('Singlish') is well known, among other features, for its class of discourse particles derived from substrate languages. These particles have been ascribed to various languages, chief among them Southern Min, Malay, and Cantonese. Previous research has also shown this class to be open to newcomers, with Lim (2007) concentrating on particles of Cantonese origin appearing in the 1980s. In this paper, I present evidence of a previously undocumented particle,  bah , whose origins are suspected in Mandarin, a variety that has hitherto contributed only little to the grammatical structure of Singlish. Using corpus data complemented by data from online discussion forums, as well as responses to an online survey, the paper describes  bah 's pragmatic meanings and the socio-historical and sociolinguistic reasons for its emergence

The trouble with world Englishes

Ever since the 1980s, when research interest in the field of 'World Englishes' began to gather speed, the view of the English language around the world has been largely dominated by the construct of so-called 'varieties' of English. These varieties are usually given a geographical label ('Singapore English', 'Welsh English', 'South African English', 'Fiji English', etc), and are described in terms of their pronunciation, their grammar, and their vocabulary. The resulting anthologies (see e.g. Wells, 1982; Trudgill & Hannah, 1982; Kortmann et al., 2004) have contributed a lot to our understanding of how English varies globally, as well as to raising the profile of non-inner circle (Kachru, 1985) varieties, which had previously not benefited from as much attention. Ever since the 1980s, when research interest in the field of 'World Englishes' began to gather speed, the view of the English language around the world has been largely dominated by the construct of so-called 'varieties' of English. These varieties are usually given a geographical label ('Singapore English', 'Welsh English', 'South African English', 'Fiji English', etc), and are described in terms of their pronunciation, their grammar, and their vocabulary. The resulting anthologies (see e.g. Wells, 1982; Trudgill & Hannah, 1982; Kortmann et al., 2004) have contributed a lot to our understanding of how English varies globally, as well as to raising the profile of non-inner circle (Kachru, 1985) varieties, which had previously not benefited from as much attention

Singapore English: Structure, variation, and usage

In recent years the study of English and its global varieties has grown rapidly as a field of study. The English language in Singapore, famous for its vernacular known as 'Singlish', is of particular interest to linguists because it takes accent, dialect and lexical features from a wide range of languages including Malay, Mandarin, Hokkien and Tamil, as well as being influenced by the Englishes of Britain, Australia and America. This book gives a comprehensive overview of English in Singapore by setting it within a historical context and drawing on recent developments in the field of indexicality, world Englishes and corpus research. Through application of the indexicality framework Jakob Leimgruber offers readers a new way of thinking about and analysing the unique syntactic, semantic and phonological structure of Singapore English. This book is ideal for researchers and advanced students interested in Singapore and its languages. In recent years the study of English and its global varieties has grown rapidly as a field of study. The English language in Singapore, famous for its vernacular known as 'Singlish', is of particular interest to linguists because it takes accent, dialect and lexical features from a wide range of languages including Malay, Mandarin, Hokkien and Tamil, as well as being influenced by the Englishes of Britain, Australia and America. This book gives a comprehensive overview of English in Singapore by setting it within a historical context and drawing on recent developments in the field of indexicality, world Englishes and corpus research. Through application of the indexicality framework Jakob Leimgruber offers readers a new way of thinking about and analysing the unique syntactic, semantic and phonological structure of Singapore English. This book is ideal for researchers and advanced students interested in Singapore and its languages

Singlish as defined by young educated Chinese Singaporeans

Colloquial Singapore English, or Singlish, exists in an environment characterised by strong language planning aimed at demoting it in favour of Standard English, as well as in a linguistic ecology featuring a number of languages that have had an impact on its current form. An actual definition of Singlish, beyond scholarly linguistic analyses, is less than straightforward, and this article sets out to address this. Chinese Singaporeans were asked to define Singlish, and elements of Hokkien (one of the major substrate languages involved in the emergence of the contact variety) in conjunction with Singlish were subjected to attitudinal ratings. The results call for a redefinition of Singlish not in terms of a clear set of features that set it apart from other varieties, but rather as a combination of linguistic resources that combine to create a stylistic repertoire appropriate for the expression of, among other stances, local identity. Colloquial Singapore English, or Singlish, exists in an environment characterised by strong language planning aimed at demoting it in favour of Standard English, as well as in a linguistic ecology featuring a number of languages that have had an impact on its current form. An actual definition of Singlish, beyond scholarly linguistic analyses, is less than straightforward, and this article sets out to address this. Chinese Singaporeans were asked to define Singlish, and elements of Hokkien (one of the major substrate languages involved in the emergence of the contact variety) in conjunction with Singlish were subjected to attitudinal ratings. The results call for a redefinition of Singlish not in terms of a clear set of features that set it apart from other varieties, but rather as a combination of linguistic resources that combine to create a stylistic repertoire appropriate for the expression of, among other stances, local identity

The management of multilingualism in a city-state: Language policy in Singapore

Language policy in Singapore exists against a background of large diversity, a diversity that has been present in the city-state ever since its founding, and which is manifest both in ethnic and in linguistic terms. The government deals with this diversity in several ways: firstly, in giving recognition to the three major ethnic groups (Chinese, Malays, and Indians) by assigning them an official language (Mandarin, Malay, and Tamil, respectively), and secondly, by endorsing English as the main working (and educational, administrative, governmental, etc.) language of the country. Further policies include the demotion of varieties without official status: specifically non-Mandarin varieties of Chinese and Singlish, the local English vernacular. This paper explores these policies and the reasons that motivated them. Language policy in Singapore exists against a background of large diversity, a diversity that has been present in the city-state ever since its founding, and which is manifest both in ethnic and in linguistic terms. The government deals with this diversity in several ways: firstly, in giving recognition to the three major ethnic groups (Chinese, Malays, and Indians) by assigning them an official language (Mandarin, Malay, and Tamil, respectively), and secondly, by endorsing English as the main working (and educational, administrative, governmental, etc.) language of the country. Further policies include the demotion of varieties without official status: specifically non-Mandarin varieties of Chinese and Singlish, the local English vernacular. This paper explores these policies and the reasons that motivated them

Montreal's linguistic landscape: Instances of top-down and bottom-up language planning

In Montreal, federal bilingualism, provincial monolingualism, and municipal realities of widespread bilingualism have all left a deep impression on the linguistic landscape of the city. Legislation of the languages on public signs was enacted in 1977, with a view to unambiguously project a visage français (Levine 1989) of Montreal, a projection aimed, in no small part, to immigrants considering which language to shift toward. Initially requiring all outdoor signage to be monolingually French, the Charter of the French language now mandates French to be present and «markedly predominant» if accompanied by other languages. Top-down legislation regulating the linguistic landscape (LL) comes from both provincial and federal sources. However, bottom-up (Ben-Rafael et al 2006) policies embraced by a variety of stakeholders (com- munity groups, individual businesses, private persons) also leave visible traces in the LL, and the way languages are used in these manifestations interacts in interesting ways with the legislation. Considering language choices in the LL emanating from the «grassroots», and bearing in mind that these may have the potential to redress power inequalities (Tollefson 2013), this chapter presents examples found in Montreal’s LL that give visibility to the city’s multiple languages, thus claiming their legitimacy. The resulting LL, notwithstanding the huge diversity of languages and the important mediating role of English, remains, for the most part, «markedly predominantly» French

Singapore English: An indexical approach

Existing models of variation for Singapore English, with the possible exception of Alsagoff's cultural orientation model, are largely unsatisfactory in accounting for the high degree of SinglishStandard alternation found in everyday speech. The occurrence, for instance, of Singlish elements in otherwise Standard speech is a challenge. An approach based on indexicality enables a less code-based, more inclusive analysis, allowing for a multitude of codes from various languages to be taken into account. Thus, the clear separation of varieties such as Singlish, Standard English, Mandarin, Hokkien, etc., is deconstructed, and their interplay highlighted. The data presented herein shows the strength of such a model, and raises questions as to the appropriateness of independent, distinct varieties in the speech community at hand