It's 2012 now. A year that has long been predicted by Mayans to be the end of human civilisations on Earth. Whether this is true or not, us Muslims refused to accept such widely hysterical phenomenon. The truth lies in those who see. Who knows better than He does.
History
Now, detaching away from all this apocalyptic thingy, I am here to discuss my opinion on Bruneians (some) attitude toward English. A kingdom divided it seems, this issue has been my favorite ever since I first learned to love the language in question many years ago (after ultimately failing at mathematics time and time again!). Personally, learning English has given me some, if not all, opportunity in trying to move freely between the layers of today's society. It is as important as Arabic to Muslims worldwide. One of the first things I have noticed in the past is that people, especially students, are tend to be more ambivalent with English language. This so happened when I was still in secondary school. I'll have to be honest, some of the Kedayan - born children appeared to have been brought up to loathe foreign language (i.e. English). Teachers who taught English at school (the one I went to) are subjected to ridicule and mockery. In their minds, English is not the national language as opposed to Bahasa Melayu, Brunei Malay or Kedayan so why bother learning it at all. In the end, a lot of my past colleagues do not make it to high school, let alone university. During my stint in UBD, my female friend (who by now has given me cold feet; call it disconnected if you like) and I are the only two students from the class of 06 (out of 30 plus students) who have managed to set foot on this campus, with she pursuing major in Bahasa Melayu dan Linguistik. Others have either worked and married, while two or three colleagues decided to continue on studying backed by parents' funding. This however should not be taken at face value; some of my former classmates are quite good in English and they even taught me a few things, especially the grammar. Looking back I realised that their Achilles heel is vocabulary. Ironically, the latter is my forte since it is very interesting to know the meaning of many English words. Once dubbed a 'living dictionary' by Ms. Farida, who are often torn between scolding me for being lazy and praising my ability in helping her to translate certain sentences to friends of mine who do not get what she has just said. Second comes Mr. Ravi (forever known amongst class of 06 as Mr. Vivid), a Mauritian import personality with whom we are nevertheless attached to due to his patience in keeping up with our slothful and combative attitude. He was, and still is one of the best teachers who taught us English with passion and dedication. It is sad that a lot of my classmates in the past treated him for granted, ignoring his every word as if he does not exist at all.
Transient period during high school years is fortunately free from language issues and rivalry. At least that is how I see it. By then everybody has realised its significance both in academic settings or informal, outdoor environment. It is this time where I began to actually 'learn' English, giving my full attention to it as I have now completely abandoned disheartening frivolousness and superficiality that once plagued my performance. This fact is supported by a totally trivial and unrelated reason; my interest in black and death. Both played a significant role during the early development stage of my English learning capability. Such extreme genres employed vastly rich vocabularies, some of which are not entirely made available in English (a lot are Norwegian, Swedish, Latin, Hungarian and Portuguese). Songs like No Jesus, No Beast, Behead the Prophet (No Lord Shall Live), and I Cum Blood are some of the most profane lyrics I have ever read. The complicated vocabularies and non - standard grammar usage have forced me to open up my dictionary, with grammatical consultations provided by my high school tutor who at first was quite reluctant to do the explanation, as the tracks are completely offensive and Satanic. This, coupled with my fascination over science fiction and horror films have done me a great favor in leading me onto the next steps. With the advent of internet technology, knowledge is simply one click away.
Notable Issues
Things do not just happen without reasons. This universe exists with a chain of reasoning. It is up to us humans to apply the knowledge and logic to what people see throughout their lives on this planet. Similarly, positivity cannot exist without the opposing forces of negativity in what can be called as symbiotic relationship between the two. One can actually begin to comprehend the analogy here; what drives people to hate English while at the same times it is highly regarded among academicians and students alike. Theoretically, this issue is culture specific in a sense that the pinnacle of this discussion is not a problem to begin with; yes, as you may have it all figured out, people are the problem.
Now, this is rather a controversial analysis of some of the issues that are currently rampant in Brunei's society. First, education begins from home. Any disjointed misconceptions about the real world may have been permeated by generations - long indoctrination, which is to remain hostile to anything considered alien to the existing culture. Theoretically speaking, one can assume that enmity towards English stems from conservative thinking. As such, inability to accept or learn something that is perceived by fellow community members as 'different' will be subjected to defamation. There is also this subconsciously embedded fear towards English that, coupled with stereotypes, have [sic] actually forced people to believe that whoever speaks well in such a language will have lower proficiency in Malay related issues, culture included. Domestic situation and a person upbringing do play a significant role in early stages of development towards hating English in general. This is perhaps the basest of all misfortune, the one that grows with age and it will not stop unless the person does something to mitigate any misconception regarding his or her conviction on English language.
It just did not stop at that. Some locals even go as far as to accuse non - native English speaking bunch as being stripped of their Islamic beliefs that they are too Western to even be called Malays anymore. I have no further comment on this except that I am quite disappointed with how negative some Bruneians can be with something beneficial as English.
Solutions
There are no real solutions as of now. As long as people do not change their attitude, things will stay the same.
Notable Issues
Things do not just happen without reasons. This universe exists with a chain of reasoning. It is up to us humans to apply the knowledge and logic to what people see throughout their lives on this planet. Similarly, positivity cannot exist without the opposing forces of negativity in what can be called as symbiotic relationship between the two. One can actually begin to comprehend the analogy here; what drives people to hate English while at the same times it is highly regarded among academicians and students alike. Theoretically, this issue is culture specific in a sense that the pinnacle of this discussion is not a problem to begin with; yes, as you may have it all figured out, people are the problem.
Now, this is rather a controversial analysis of some of the issues that are currently rampant in Brunei's society. First, education begins from home. Any disjointed misconceptions about the real world may have been permeated by generations - long indoctrination, which is to remain hostile to anything considered alien to the existing culture. Theoretically speaking, one can assume that enmity towards English stems from conservative thinking. As such, inability to accept or learn something that is perceived by fellow community members as 'different' will be subjected to defamation. There is also this subconsciously embedded fear towards English that, coupled with stereotypes, have [sic] actually forced people to believe that whoever speaks well in such a language will have lower proficiency in Malay related issues, culture included. Domestic situation and a person upbringing do play a significant role in early stages of development towards hating English in general. This is perhaps the basest of all misfortune, the one that grows with age and it will not stop unless the person does something to mitigate any misconception regarding his or her conviction on English language.
It just did not stop at that. Some locals even go as far as to accuse non - native English speaking bunch as being stripped of their Islamic beliefs that they are too Western to even be called Malays anymore. I have no further comment on this except that I am quite disappointed with how negative some Bruneians can be with something beneficial as English.
Solutions
There are no real solutions as of now. As long as people do not change their attitude, things will stay the same.
I cannot agree with you more on the ambivalent and overall negative attitude that some people have towards English. Even during my years in Ugama School, I was constantly ostracized simply because I spoke English. I find it sad, however, that this attitude has not changed much, though it has lessened. Sometimes I can still hear strangers make fun of me because of my English (and surprisingly, they are always teens!).
ReplyDeletePrecisely. I believed that this problem knows no end... as long as there are people who prefer one over the other. It has lessened in recent years, but my involvement with social networking fan pages (local) says otherwise. I've been ridiculed a lot of times. There was once this discussion on Facebook fan page about demonic possession / kerasukan as us Malays called it. I gave them a bit of explanations as to why some people were susceptible to this kind of anomaly, taking into account from both medical and Islamic perspective. I did code switch here and there. What some of them did were to make fun of me (just because they didn't get certain words, while others were fine with it). They went as far as calling me names, such as 'un - Islamic'. I still remember how unsettling it was for me to read their comments where the person stated that I was probably unable to recite even a simple Al Fatihah! How ridiculous!!! This is just what I observed among some Bruneians; bodoh sombong. They could've asked me what those explanations were but they didn't. Brunei.. Brunei...
ReplyDeleteIt always saddens me when people ridicule others, whatever the reasons. My hope is that giving people a university sill enable them to overcome such prejudices; but I'm not sure we are always successful.
ReplyDeleteHeavy metal music is maybe not a bad way of learning English. I used to love Black Sabbath -- I even went to concert by them when I was 17. It was very loud! But great fun.
You see sir, this kind of attitude not only reflect the way some Bruneians think, but it also shows how deliberate they are in keeping themselves away from wisdom and progression. People are the problem, not the language itself.
ReplyDeleteWow! You went to see Black Sabbath?? You had probably watched them perform with original lineup!! Yes, I do agree that heavy metal in general has helped me to get acquainted with English. It depends on how we take this type of entertainment.