For the eighth monthly online Wacana Warisan Series (WWS) organised by the Malay Heritage Foundation (MHF), Dr. Azhar Ibrahim conducted a 90-minute webinar on the topic of “The Destiny of Language and Its Relation to Heritage”. He is an academic from the Department of Malay Studies, at the National University of Singapore (NUS) and Vice-Chairman of the MHF Board. For this month’s topic on language, Dr. Azhar delivered the webinar entirely in English.
Saturday, 28 August 2021 — Dr. Azhar shared with fellow participants that August is also the month of Bulan Bahasa (Malay Language Month). Bulan Bahasa is a month-long event to celebrate and champion the Malay language nationwide. To honor the month dedicated to the Malay language, Dr. Azhar chose to give a webinar on the topic “The Destiny of Language and its Relations to Heritage”.
After a quick rundown of the past topics that WWS covered this year, Dr. Azhar’s webinar introduction began with an opening question: “We often imagined that language and heritage are indivisible. Is this always the case?”. In other words, “Can we truly appreciate and learn our heritage when we remove the Mother Tongue?”. Dr. Azhar answered that there is no direct answer to this question. It depends on the circumstances and strategies of how we want to introduce discourse on heritage to a targeted community. Therefore, it is important to dissect this in cases abroad and our own, which was the aim of this webinar.
After sharing an excerpt of Munshi Abdullah’s writing in his autobiography that stresses the importance of language and its relation to heritage, Dr. Azhar introduced his 6 postulations (above) on the connection of these two. He then dived deeper into the webinar’s content, beginning with the destiny of language. It is said that the destiny of language is a linguistic matter and the human’s agency to act and motivate. It enriches and enlarges our passion for heritage, as well. However, our conception of heritage would affect our language in the long run.
Moving on to defining heritage, Dr. Azhar emphasized that heritage must be a living culture otherwise it becomes a repository of the past. Societies and elites have defined heritage in many ways. He noted that in many developing countries it is common to see that if only feudalistic elements of the past are selected and elevated as heritage — it is no surprise that language and thinking corpus could remain essentially feudal. Additionally, if only colonial elements of the past are cherished and revered as heritage — the corpus of ideas and language cannot go beyond the colonial parlance.
Dr. Azhar proceeded to share some interesting phenomena on the interrelations between language and heritage. Starting with the Baba Nonya Peranakan culture, he explained how their culture is prominently shown in exhibits from their outfits, cuisine and furniture even though their language, the Peranakan Malay is rarely emphasized.
Another case study that was brought up is Bahasa Indonesia. Younger generations of Indonesian from Javanese, Sudanese, Balinese, Bugis, Batak, Papuan ethnicity, etc. speak mostly in Bahasa Indonesia. Dr. Azhar stressed that this happens in many developing countries when they begin choosing a national language. This shows the appreciation of heritage in another dominant but related language. The different ethnicities still keep their strong cultures and heritage however, the attachment to their mother tongue is decreasing.
The third example comes from our neighbours in Thailand. Dr. Azhar explained that the Malays in southern Thailand largely use the Jawi script even on street signages and in schools. The language heritage is preserved but it is largely isolated from the socio-cultural dynamics of the region. Dr. Azhar said that the enthusiasm to restore Malay language for them is high, however, the rest of Nusantara, Malay language including Bahasa Indonesia is largely in the Melayu Rumi (romanised script).
Orang Asli (Indigenous People) have experienced the loss of culture as modernisation takes over. Dr. Azhar shared a case study from the Malay-speaking Orang Laut (Sea People or People of the Sea) in Johor, Malaysia. They have lost a great amount of their cultural heritage including their crafts, dance and oral memories as the young ones move to the city and infiltration of modernization takes over. Far from Asia, Dr. Azhar introduced his next example from America. The death of language and the demise of heritage in many minority communities around the world include the tragic and unfortunate situation of American Indian tribes in North America. They have been decimated by colonialism, modern nation-states and corporate intrusion.
In some rare cases, there is language appreciation outside of the community. Aramaic language is an example of this. It is a Semitic language that has a close relationship with the Hebrew and Arabic language. It was purportedly used by the early Christians. Now, Arabic has replaced Aramaic, even in church services. The Aramaic language has only survived in a remote Syrian town, North of Damascus called Malulu. In this town, the Aramaic language is spoken by both Muslims and Christians. Israel, on the other hand, is an example of how language and heritage are equally boosted and developed due to the political significance and cause. In 1948, Hebrew became the national language for Israel. It became a modern language for administration, education, science and technology, as well as encapsulating Jewish identity, culture and heritage.
To sum up the relation of language to heritage, Dr. Azhar highlighted 8 points towards the end of the webinar:
- Generally, there is a correlation between a language and the people’s cultural tradition and roots;
- But a language – only to cater for heritage, tradition, culture – will remain like a dialect – will not be able to expand in Gramscian terms;
- A heritage needs the language (for its continuity and vitality) but language can evolve and develop without even heritage as its appendage;
- Language can produce or form parts of heritage, but heritage cannot take the great task of language;
- We need language to give full meaning, spirit and sparks to our heritage;
- Moreover, language should function to define heritage concretely and symbolically;
- Language should be the human will and act to point to us the relevance and significance of heritage and;
- It is via language too that heritage should be re-defined, re-conceptualised and re-created.
The WWS webinar had a closing Q&A section, where Dr. Azhar addressed several questions from the virtual audience who tuned in via Zoom and Facebook live. More than 30 participants tuned in to the video webinar.
WWS is a series of lectures that aim to encourage the development of new and alternative approaches to the understanding of Malay history, economy, politics, society, and culture. Beyond the clichés and convenient mainstream narratives, lie many lesser-known facts about the Malay community in Singapore. It is a year-long programme (each lecture runs monthly), comprising 12 sessions from January to December 2021. Participants who register and attend via Zoom for at least 10 sessions will be given a Certificate of Attendance. WWS lectures will mostly be delivered in Malay.
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