FAKULTI PENDIDIKAN DAN BAHASA

HBET1403
SOCIOLINGUISTICS IN LANGUAGE TEACHING

NAMA

NOMBOR MATRIK

NO KAD PENGENALAN

NOMBOR TELEFON

E-MAIL

PUSAT PEMBELAJARAN

: OUM CAWANGAN TAWAU

MEI 2015

CONTENTS
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CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
WHAT IS DIALECT?
7 CRITERIA THAT DIFFERENTIATE LANGUAGE

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AND DIALECT BASED ON BELL 1976

APPROPRIATE SOCIAL DIALECT
CONCLUSION
REFERENCES

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INTRODUCTION

PAGES
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Malaysia is a multi-racial society which is strongly bounded by its system of monarchy.

However, Malays form the largest portion of its demography, with Malay as its national
language. Though Malay is still the most commonly used lingua franca among Malaysians,
English is gaining more importance and relevance in the country. In fact, Malaysians have
come to realize that it is no longer necessary, nor desirable to aim at an English native
speakers speech to achieve their communicative function.
However, there has been a strong decline in the levels of English proficiency in the country.
This is evident in Malaysians everyday speech, which are often marred by grammatical and
phonological errors or at times too loaded with suffixes (e.g. lah, lor, meh) and loan words
from other languages.
English is the second most important language in Malaysia. It is used in various professions
and is an important requirement in Malaysian academic settings. The academic setting is a
microcosm of the Malaysian population, which is a mix of interlocutors of different racial
and language backgrounds. They may also differ in their English language proficiency levels.
Therefore, it could be assumed that in Malaysian schools unique language environment,
sociolinguistic competence contributes to Malaysian students English language proficiency.
The standard variety of English used in our country is the variety that is taught formally in
schools and the Standard British English is the linguistic model in the education system of
Malaysia. However in Malaysia, English, being the second language, is learnt for a functional
purpose. The most important measure of success when a language is learnt for a functional
purpose is communicative effectiveness; that is, whether the language enabled the learners to
achieve the purpose of learning.
A dialect is a language variation spoken by a particular ethnic, social or regional group and is
an element of the group's collective identity (Ogbu, 1999). Each dialect within a language is
just as logical, complex and rule-governed as the standard form of the language (often called
standard variety). Malaysian English (or Manglish) is a non-native variety of English and is
one of the most prominent features of Malaysia's linguistic corpus.
Malaysian English is the result of various processes like simplification, acculturation and
generalization by the local community, making it exclusively Malaysian. In Malaysian
educational institutions, the usage of Standard English is emphasized. However, the speakers
have adopted the language to suit their needs and convenience when it comes to
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communicating. Some Malaysian English-speaking people use the informal approach when
writing to family and friends. Most Malaysians are very comfortable using this variety
although there may be some who try very hard to imitate the L1 variety and frown upon
this unique L2 variety. Many regard the variety as a deviation from the parent language
resulting in fossilization (Selinker, 1972). On the other hand, there are also scholars who
refute 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 this assignment, a thoroughly discussion will be done on what is dialect, 7 criteria that
differentiate language and dialect based on Bell 1976, and appropriate social dialect.
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WHAT IS DIALECT

Nations are by no means monolithic linguisticallytypically, there are hundreds of regional

dialects within the same language. These dialects reflect the everyday experience of
individuals living in different parts of the country and strongly shape their cultural identity.
Someone from Sabah, say, sounds very different than someone from Sarawak, and if they
speak to each other, they will have a good guess as to where the other is from. Some dialects
are more closely related than others.
For example, the Liverpool dialect (Scouse) has many Irish and Welsh influences, but it is
quite distinct from the English spoken in other parts of the United Kingdom, including the
neighbouring regions of Chesire and Lancashire. What is more, depending on their own
regional provenance, people tend to associate certain images and stereotypes with particular
dialects; as George Bernard Shaw puts it: It is impossible for an Englishman to open his
mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him (Pygmalion, 1916).
Similar phenomena exist in many other languages, but the economic consequences of dialect
differences are poorly understood.
There are different varieties of English used here in Malaysia. The important issue here is
what would be considered as an acceptable variety of English for Malaysian students? In
Malaysia, there is a strong tradition of teaching English when learners are still very young.
Also, due to home language interferences and strong media influence, which at times
popularises Manglish as a more convenient spoken variety, Malaysian students might not
have enough exposure to models of Standard English. Parents might communicate with their
children in strong accented English which is unique to each cultural/racial group, or/and even
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in broken or grammatically incorrect English. This variety of English could be

incomprehensible at times.
Malaysia is known as a multiracial country. We have several race such as Chinese, Indian and
Malay. As in Sabah and Sarawak, there are more than 30 race. Every race has its own culture,
languages, dialects and religion. Thus, this is the reason why there are dialects in language
especially in Malaysia. In aspect of English language, this dialects we called as Malaysian
English (ME).
Some words of ME reflect the multilingual traits of the country. The existence of loan words
in the lexis of ME is very rampant and common, especially since Malaysia is a Malay
dominated country both in language and culture. Moreover there are no lexical equivalents of
certain Malay words in English. Listed below is a list of commonly used borrowed words and
phrases which have made their way into the repertoire of speech among speakers of
Manglish.
At the lexical level, some words of ME used by students reflect the multilingual traits of the
country. There exist loan words from contact languages such as Chinese (ta-paw, pu-yao) and
Bahasa Malayu (makan). Using substrate lexemes plural in the usual English way is common,
e.g. kopios coffees (kop-o, black coffee), Menteri Besar (head of state government) and
pengarahs (directors). Other cultural expressions adopted in ME,
for instance:
Kadhi (religious judge) impose a fine for khalwat (illicit proximity to the opposite
sex)
Don't act so ulufied (backward, not hip) Wear something more stylo (stylish)
Lets go ngerdate (dating), an Indonesian slang very common among the Malays.
Hello thamby, (boy) one cup of coffee please.
An example of a short conversation in colloquial Malaysian English (non-standard English)
may sound like this:
Housewife : Your fish so flabby, no good one.

Fishmonger : Like that already hard what. How hard one you want? You want stone,
want wood. I can't find.
Housewife : You half-past six lawyer one. Give little bit cheap la, this fish.
Fishmonger : Oh, that's why you said that kind, said my thing flabby, you want
Cheap-cheap.
Housewife : You don't want give, I look other places.
Fishmonger : Look, look la, wait you come back look for me also.
(Adibah Aroin, New Straits Times, 3V December 1992)
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7 CRITERIA THAT DIFFERENTIATE LANGUAGE AND DIALECT BASED

ON BELL 1976
Bella (1976) has listed seven criteria that may be useful in discussing different kinds of
languages. According to Bell, these criteria (standardization, vitality, historicity,
autonomy, reduction, mixture, and de facto norms) may be used to distinguish certain
languages from others. They also make it possible to speak of some languages as being more
developed in certain ways than others, thus addressing a key issue in the languagedialect
distinction, since speakers usually feel that languages are generally better than dialects in
some sense.
Standardization refers to the process by which a language has been codified in some way.
That process usually involves the development of such things as grammars, spelling books,
and dictionaries, and possibly a literature. We can often associate specific items or events
with standardization, e.g., Wycliffes and Luthers translations of the Bible into English and
German, respectively, Caxtons establishment of printing in England, and Dr Johnsons
dictionary of English published in 1755. Standardization also requires that a measure of
agreement be achieved about what is in the language and what is not.
Vitality, the second of Bells seven criteria, refers to the existence of a living community of
speakers. This criterion can be used to distinguish languages that are alive from those that
are dead. Two Celtic languages of the United Kingdom are now dead: Manx, the old
language of the Isle of Man, and Cornish. Manx died out after World War II, and Cornish
disappeared at the end of the eighteenth century, one date often cited being 1777, when the
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last known speaker, Dorothy Pentreath of Mousehole, died. Many of the aboriginal languages
of the Americas are also dead. Latin is dead in this sense too for no one speaks it as a native
language; it exists only in a written form frozen in time, pronounced rather than spoken, and
studied rather than used. Once a language dies it is gone for all time and not even the socalled revival of Hebrew contradicts that assertion.
Historicity refers to the fact that a particular group of people finds a sense of identity through
using a particular language: it belongs to them. Social, political, religious, or ethnic ties may
also be important for the group, but the bond provided by a common language may prove to
be the strongest tie of all. In the nineteenth century a German nation was unified around the
German language just as in the previous century Russians had unified around a revitalized
Russian language. Historicity can be long-standing: speakers of the different varieties of
colloquial Arabic make much of a common linguistic ancestry, as obviously do speakers of
Chinese. It can also, as with Hebrew, be appealed to as a unifying force among a threatened
people.
Autonomy is an interesting concept because it is really one of feeling. A language must be
felt by its speakers to be different from other languages. However, this is a very subjective
criterion. Ukrainians say their language is quite different from Russian and deplored its
Russification when they were part of the Soviet Union. Some speakers of African American
Vernacular English (see chapter 14) maintain that their language is not a variety of English
but is a separate language in its own right and refer to it as Ebonics. In contrast, speakers of
Cantonese and Mandarin deny that they speak different languages: they maintain that
Cantonese and Mandarin are not autonomous languages but are just two dialects of Chinese.
As we will see (chapter 3), creole and pidgin languages cause us not a few problems when we
try to apply this criterion: how autonomous are such languages?
Reduction refers to the fact that a particular variety may be regarded as a sub-variety rather
than as an independent entity. Speakers of Cockney will almost certainly say that they speak a
variety of English, admit that they are not representative speakers of English, and recognize
the existence of other varieties with equivalent subordinate status. Sometimes the reduction is
in the kinds of opportunities afforded to users of the variety. For example, there may be a
reduction of resources; that is, the variety may lack a writing system. Or there may be
considerable restrictions in use; e.g., pidgin languages are very much reduced in the functions
they serve in society in contrast to standardized languages.
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Mixture refers to feelings speakers have about the purity of the variety they speak. This
criterion appears to be more important to speakers of some languages than of others, e.g.,
more important to speakers of French and German than to speakers of English. However, it
partly explains why speakers of pidgins and creoles have difficulty in classifying what they
speak as full languages: these varieties are, in certain respects, quite obviously mixed, and
the people who speak them often feel that the varieties are neither one thing nor another, but
rather are debased, deficient, degenerate, or marginal varieties of some other standard
language.
Finally, having de facto norms refers to the feeling that many speakers have that there are
both good speakers and poor speakers and that the good speakers represent the norms of
proper usage. Sometimes this means focusing on one particular sub-variety as representing
the best usage, e.g., Parisian French or the Florentine variety of Italian. Standards must not
only be established (by the first criterion above), they must also be observed.
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APPROPRIATE SOCIAL DIALECT

Dialects are an unavoidable reality, and our judgments about them are never neutral. We
make judgments about social class, ethnicity, regional background, education and a host of
other social characteristics based simply on the kind of language people are using. In fact,
many people believe that language differences are the single most reliable indicator
of social position in our society. When we live a certain way or belong to a certain group, we
are expected to match that lifestyle with our talk, and when we do not, people notice.
Communication is not only about producing linguistically correct utterances, but also about
being extralinguistically apt when uttering them. In addition, communication is also an
individuals need to establish an atmosphere of sociability (Salzmann, 1993:198, cited in
Raja Rozina, 2004), for solidarity (Raja Rozina, 2004) and for social identification (Suzuki,
1998, cited in Guan & Park, 2009).
To maintain good rapport and achieve solidarity, one needs to be extralinguistically correct.
In Hymes terms (1974), being extra linguistically correct is having communicative
competence. With communicative competence, one knows what to say and what not to say in
any specific cultural context (Govindasamy, 1994). Maintaining good rapport and achieving
solidarity is done through the use of politeness.

Politeness in general terms is being tactful, modest and nice to other people (Yule,
2000:134). When one does that, one is regarded as positively associated with tolerance,
restraint, good manners, and showing deference to other people (BlumKulka, 2005:257).
According to Brown and Levinson (1987, 1978), the aim of politeness is to communicate
politeness and sincerely engage in polite behavior by using polite linguistic forms or
strategies (cited in Jary, 1998:3).
That is the reason why we should use an appropriate social dialect. It will shows respect and
politeness to the people we communicate with. There are said, When in Rome, do as the
Romans do. Thus, we have to use appropriate social dialect when communicate with other
people whether from Malaysia or other countries.
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CONCLUSION

Our consideration of various issues has revealed above all how complex a thing a language is,
or any variety of a language. Languages are just as complex as societies, and we all know
how difficult it is to make generalizations about those. That languages should be so complex
is not surprising. Languages and societies are related, and social and linguistic complexity are
not unrelated.
All cultures and all languages are extremely complex. Some may actually be more complex
than others, but we do not as yet have an exhaustive and definitive study of a single culture or
of a single language from anywhere in the world, nor are there any immediate prospects of
one. If both the culture and language of any group of people almost defy adequate
description, then we can be assured that the relationships that certainly exist between the two
are not likely to be more transparent, even to well-informed observers.
(2682 words)
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REFERENCES

Grimes, Barbara F. Ed. (1996). ETHNOLOGUE: Languages of the World. Thirteenth Edition.
Dallas, Texas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.
King, Julie K. and John Wayne King. (1984). Languages of Sabah: A Survey Report. Pacific
Linguistics, Series C - No. 78. Canberra, ACT: The Australian National University.

Parkhurst, Steven and Dianne. (1997). Introduction. (Part of the final write-up of the LSE
survey). Unpublished paper.
Parkhurst, Steven and Dianne. (1998). Introduction to Sign Language Survey. Notes on
Sociolinguistics 3:215-242. Dallas, Texas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.
Bell, R. T. (1976). Sociolinguistics: Goals, Approaches and Problems. London: Batsford.
Biber, D. and E. Finegan (eds.) (1994). Sociolinguistic Perspectives on Register. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.

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