Adachi Gardens, Yasugi, Japan.
More than thirty years ago, when I first step foot on
Singapore soil and joined the then Institute of Education, my fellow trainee
teachers and lecturers gave me hard time because of the way I spoke. They asked
about my “accent” and made it clear that they did not approve of it. It was all
very bewildering to me then as I had spent my youth and university days in
Kuala Lumpur and nobody had said that I had an accent.
After more than thirty years here, I sometimes still get
this same reaction to my spoken English. I was reminded of this again just last
week when I was working with a group of children on their writing skills. When
I stopped to speak to one of the boys, he responded by speaking in what was
obviously a fake American accent, and he kept adding “y’all” to all his
statements. At first I thought he was a foreigner but after a few exchanges, it
dawned on me that he was mocking me, or more specifically my “accent”. But this wasn’t the first and only time. In
previous encounters, boys(never girls somehow) have asked me in their own
inimitable Singlish style, why I speak the way I do.
Frankly, I wish I knew why. I can only attribute it to my
Convent teachers, my Eurasian neighbours and my love, then, for everything Enid
Blyton. But then again, people who think I “slang-slang” also don’t know that I
speak fluent Cantonese and Malay, the latter with a more than adequate accent
to allow me to pass off as an ethnic Malay or Peranakan when I am on the phone.
I personally don’t think an accent makes communication any
more effective. And I don’t really think I have any kind of weird accent. I, in fact, heartily dislike the fake accents
that I hear every now and then over the radio and in public gatherings. These
“accents” turn me off and I no longer hear the message that the speaker is
attempting to communicate to me. So, I don’t advocate teaching our pupils to
speak with any kind of accent, other than clear and correct pronunciation.
But what I don’t understand is why, with all our emphasis on
English as a school language and an official and working language in Singapore,
people here still take pride in speaking less than perfect English. Does doing
so make one more Asian? The answer cannot be yes, for despite the way I speak
English, I bet that I am more grounded in both Cantonese and Malay cultures
than many people I know who only speak Singlish. What I find more unforgivable
is when this attitude towards English is passed on to young children so that
they prefer to speak like Lee Tock Kong in Police
and Thieves instead of like the Prime Minister.
I am prompted to reflect on this issue, not only because of
my encounter with the mocking boy, but also because recent reports on changes
in the PSLE have led people to once again talk about the importance of oral and
speaking skills. I don’t know if people, or children, can learn any language
well if they think that learning to speak it properly will rob them of some
part of their identity. Don’t we all
want to be able to master whatever we want to learn? Why can’t we be bothered
to learn to pronounce words carefully or say them in the right way? Am I truly
more Singaporean if I say LaVANder instead of LAvender?
My encounters with primary school children who are affected
by my “accent” made me realise too that these same children probably hear very
little proper spoken English in their everyday lives. But then again, I myself did not come from an
English speaking family. My first language is Cantonese and I learnt my English
in school from my teachers. Remember too that I grew up during a time when I
had to pass my second language and more in order to get on to any form of
higher education. So many of us come from working class families where English
is not spoken and we all learnt English well. Who taught us to speak well and
to learn English well?
So I would say that schools need to do more to cultivate an
environment for learning English. It seems an ironic statement given that we
only have English medium schools here. Teachers too need to do something about
their own spoken English. As a bilingual and bicultural person, I am all for
using two languages or more to express myself and I often do. But what I find disturbing is when English
teachers constantly choose to express themselves publicly in their native
languages instead of English in the school context. Who are we to ask our
pupils to speak English when we don’t?
I recall too a discussion on social mobility some time ago,
and how Singaporeans fear that it might be harder to move up the social ladder
these days. I understand parents’
concern about a better life for their children. As a teacher, I have worked to
help my students to not only achieve academic success but to also acquire the
necessary social graces that they will need in their work and social life. I
teach them to take care of their personal hygiene (like their skin), their
table manners, and yes, their speech, particularly their English. Every child
needs a crack at that top university or that top job and academic results alone
won’t cut it these days. Who wants a CEO who cannot speak good clear English?
We are a global city and we are lucky to have native
speakers as teachers in our educational institutions. It is sad that our
students find it hard to learn from a native speaker because they are not used
to the teacher’s accent. My American
friend related this account to me of how top students in a top junior college
here complained about not being able to comprehend an American teacher from
California. It’s true I have not spoken to the teacher directly but I did
wonder how thick an accent a Californian would have. Was it really his accent
or our students’ unfamiliarity with any other accent other than the likes of
Lee Tock Kong’s?
As teachers, we need to help our students understand the
need to speak well and to be proud of the fact that they do. As parents, we all
make sure that our children get the best and everything that is of good
quality. Similarly, make sure that the language they learn, be it English or
anything or any other language, is of the best quality too. Accept nothing less.
