November 25, 2021

The Little Nyonya, a critically acclaimed drama serial following the lives of an extended Peranakan family in Malacca, made its debut on Singapore’s airwaves on 25^th November 2008. Produced by Mediacorp, Singapore’s state-owned media conglomerate, The Little Nyonya received praise for its writing and direction. The show also sparked an interest in Peranakan culture amongst Singaporeans. The locally produced drama serial is fondly remembered, sparking a Chinese remake of the show in 2020.

In “Peranakans in Singapore: Responses to language endangerment and documentation” (Documentation and Maintenance of Contact Languages from South Asia to East Asia, 2019), Assistant Professor Nala Lee (NUS Department of English Language & Literature) outlines how Singapore’s Peranakan community responds to the endangerment and documentation of Baba Malay. She argues that chronicling the responses of Peranakans in Singapore will challenge the problematic assumption that they simply accept the loss of Baba Malay, and tackle the idea that contact languages — languages developed between speakers who have no common language — are not linguistically unique enough to warrant proper documentation.

Dr. Lee points out that Baba Malay, a contact language in Singapore, is classified as critically endangered. Baba Malay is a language that was developed by Peranakans — descendants of intermarriages between Chinese immigrants from the Zhangzhou and Quanzhou region and local Malay women. The Baba Malay language is now critically endangered because of the dominance of the English language, the perception that Baba Malay is an unofficial language in Singapore’s education and administrative landscape, and the decreasing number of Chinese-Malay marriages that result in Peranakan ethnicity and culture.

Through surveys with participants who have learned Baba Malay from birth, Dr. Lee gathered responses to develop an understanding of how the Peranakan community in Singapore feels about the loss of Baba Malay. From the responses, she pointed out that although older Peranakans felt that it was good for the younger generations to learn the language, it was not necessarily seen as an expression of their Peranakan identity; there were other avenues for Peranakans to showcase their identity and culture.

Her conversations with consultants, key figures in Singapore’s Peranakan community that were involved in the documentation of Baba Malay, showed optimism about the revival of the language. Dr. Lee points out that there is currently a growing interest in Baba Malay, as evidenced by the increase in the number of enthusiastic responses towards the language documentation project. She also cites the burgeoning use of digital media platforms that seek to expose younger Peranakans to Baba Malay with the aim of getting them to take up the language one day.

As illustrated by the growing number of community-driven projects — language lessons at the Gunong Sayang Association and the development of Baba Malay textbooks and learning materials — that seek to preserve Baba Malay in Singapore, Dr. Lee argues that Singapore’s Peranakan community does not accept the loss of Baba Malay, proving the original problematic assumption wrong.

Read the article here!