Bahasa Melayu? Bahasa Malaysia
Jun 6th, 2007 by Tian
On 4 June, DPM Najib Razak announced that our national language is now renamed Bahasa Malaysia.
Malaysia’s national language is Malay. There is no dispute about it. On the other hand, the statement “bahasa kebangsaan (negara) Malaysia adalah bahasa Malaysia†(Malaysia’s national language is Malaysian) sounds like a tautology.
I am actually not interested in the polemic of semantics. Call it whatever we like, Bahasa Melayu and Bahasa Malaysia has been synonymous in the mind of most Malaysians. However in my view, it is not appropriate to officially name our national language Bahasa Malaysia.
In our Constitution, the national language of the Federation of Malaysia is Bahasa Melayu (Malay). Unlike our neighbour, the name Bahasa Indonesia was coined before Indonesian state was born.
The government cited national unity as the reason for the name change. I doubt the sense of solidarity and harmony can be simply created by name calling. As long as unfair practices remain entrenched in national policies, one cannot dream of national unity.
The creation of the term Bahasa Malaysia marginalizes the status of other languages and dialects on this land. Implicitly, the new policy declared that Malay is the sole language for the nation.
In the age of plurality and diversity, we should recognize and celebrate the fact that multitude of languages are used in Malaysia. Instead of Bahasa Malaysia, there should be bahasa-bahasa Malaysia.
The second problem is that the term Bahasa Malaysia restricts or confines the development of the language to the border of the Malaysian state.
Malay or Bahasa Melayu, like English is an international language, is a lingua franca of many peoples and nations. The language has a life beyond the boundary of Malaysia.
Bahasa Melayu is not only the national language for Malaysia; it is also the official language for Brunei, and one of the official languages for Singapore. Malay is also known as Kawi is the common tongue among Muslims in Southern Thailand.
There is no reason Bahasa Malaysia separate itself for the development of Malay language at large. I don’t think Singapore’s PM Lee Hsien Loong will feel comfortable to speak Bahasa Malaysia though he is eloquent in Bahasa Melayu. I believe Brunei King Bolkiah won’t be pleased to hear that his mother tongue is Bahasa Malaysia.
I think the differences lies on what is Bahasa Malaysia and Bahasa Melayu specifically. Both are actually different! Bahasa Melayu or Malay language is the origin language that being practised traditionally by Malays (perhaps widely being used in kampungs and traditional Malay generally). Which is also the one spoken by Singapore’s PM Lee Hsien Loong and also being the mother tongue by Brunei King Bolkiah. But Bahasa Malaysia has many influences and adapted from other languages such as Arabian, Chinese, Indian, English and even Portugis. In a general dictionary of Bahasa Malaysia, there are many words such as “pokai” and “Ah Long” from Chinese, “garfu” from Portugis, “globlisasi, teknologi” from English and many new words are words which is not originally Malay, therefore it is being called Bahasa Malaysia. When many languages are being merged and adapted into the language, it is better being called Bahasa Malaysia rather than Bahasa Melayu. I think this is what it meant by “uniting the nation” by calling it Bahasa Malaysia because it is a mixture of languages of people in Malaysia not merely a single Malay language of Bahasa Melayu.