April 25, 2017

Should Singaporeans be discouraged from using Singlish in order to promote the use of Standard English? The government-initiated movement entitled Speak Good English Movement (SGEM) began in April 2000. Seeing the rising popularity of Singlish as a threat to English language competency, the government sought to educate people on the importance of using Standard English. SGEM is re-branded with new campaigning techniques every year. However, 10 years after the founding of SGEM, a counter-movement titled ‘Speak Good Singlish Movement’ (SGSM) surfaced.

Without a name or an affiliated organisation to pin to SGSM, it can be seen as a reaction against the state-mandated shunning of Singlish and other dialects. Prof Lionel Wee (Department of ELL), in Linguistic chutzpah and the Speak Good Singlish Movement (World Englishes, 2014), coins the term ‘linguistic chutzpah’ to describe the SGSM phenomenon. He defines the term as the case when speakers not only have the audacity to make alternative linguistic choices in the probable face of criticism, but also draw on linguistic knowledge to justify these choices. SGSM aims to undo the SGEM-propagated notion that Singlish is equivalent to ungrammatical or broken English, thus presenting a case of linguistic chutzpah. The article sheds light on the inherent anxieties pertaining to language use within the many layers of Singapore’s society. The government outlines a need to be able to communicate in a globally comprehensible English to keep Singapore relevant on the international market. However, this ignores the possibility that Singlish could be a cultural product of its own rather than a corruption of Standard English. Prof Wee suggests that speakers should be confident in and aware of the linguistic nuances deployed when speaking in Singlish.

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