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The Malay language, also known locally as Bahasa Melayu or Bahasa Malaysia, is an Austronesian language spoken by the Malay people who reside in the Malay Peninsula, southern Thailand, the Philippines, Singapore, central eastern Sumatra, the Riau islands, and parts of the coast of Borneo. It is an official language of Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore. It is also used as a working language in East Timor. It is very similar to Indonesian, known locally as Bahasa Indonesia, the official language of Indonesia. The official standard for Malay, as agreed upon by Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei, is the form spoken in the Riau Islands just south of Singapore, long considered the birthplace of the Malay language. In Malaysia, the language is known as Bahasa Melayu or Bahasa Malaysia, which means the Malay, or Malaysian, language. The latter term, which was introduced by the National Language Act 1967, was predominant until the 1990s, when most academics and government officials reverted to the older term, which is used in the Malay version of the Federal Constitution. Indonesia adopted a form of Malay as its official language upon independence, naming it Bahasa Indonesia and although a degree of mutual intelligibility exists, Indonesian is considerably distinct from Malay as spoken in Malaysia. In Singapore and Brunei it is known simply as Malay or Bahasa Melayu. However, many Malay dialects are not as mutually intelligible: for example, Kelantanese pronunciation is difficult even for some Malaysians to understand, while Javanese tends to have a lot of words unique to it which will be unfamiliar to other speakers of Malay. The language spoken by the Peranakan (Straits Chinese, a hybrid of Chinese settlers from the Ming Dynasty and local Malays) is a unique patois of Malay and the Chinese dialect of Hokkien, which is mostly spoken in the former Straits Settlements of Penang and Malacca. The use of this interesting language is dying out, however, with the Peranakan now choosing to speak either Hokkien or English. Malay is normally written using the Roman alphabet, although a modified Arabic script called Jawi also exists. It is an agglutinative language, meaning that the meaning of the word can be changed by adding the necessary prefixes or suffixes. Root words are either nouns or verbs, e.g. masak (to cook) yields memasak (cooks, is cooking, etc.), memasakkan (cooks, is cooking for etc.), dimasak (cooked - passive) as well as pemasak (cook - person), masakan (cooking, cookery). Many initial consonants undergo mutation when prefixes are added: e.g. sapu (sweep) becomes penyapu (broom); panggil (to call) becomes memanggil (calls, is calling, etc.), tapis (sieve) becomes menapis (sieves, is sieving, etc.) Another distinguishing feature of Malay is its use of measure words (penjodoh bilangan).
Extent of use The extent to which Malay is used in these countries varies depending on historical and cultural circumstances. Bahasa Melayu is the national language in Malaysia by article 152 of the Constitution of Malaysia, and became the sole official language in West Malaysia in 1968, and in East Malaysia gradually from 1974. English continues, however, to be widely used in professional and commercial fields and in the superior courts. Chinese, Indian and other minority languages are also commonly used by the country's large ethnic minorities. The situation in Brunei is similar to that of Malaysia. In Singapore, Malay was historically the lingua franca among people of different races and nationalities. Although this has largely given way to English, Malay still retains the status of national language and the national anthem, Majulah Singapura is entirely in Malay. Most residents of the five southernmost provinces of Thailand — a region that, for the most part, used to be part of an ancient Malay kingdom called Pattani — speak a dialect of Malay called Yawi (not to be confused with Jawi), which is similar to Kelantanese Malay, but the language has no official status or recognition. Due to earlier contact with the Philippines, Malay words have evolved and been integrated into Tagalog and other Philippine languages such as dalamhati (sympathy), luwalhati (glory), tanghali (afternoon), sarap (delicious), and many others. Some words are carried over unchanged, such as sakit. By contrast, Indonesian has successfully become the lingua franca for its disparate islands and ethnic groups, in part because the colonial language, Dutch, is no longer commonly spoken. (In East Timor, which was governed as a province of Indonesia from 1976 to 1999, Indonesian is widely spoken and recognised under its Constitution as a 'working language'.) Malaysians are easily identified due to the fact that they change their speaking styles in accordance with the person being spoken to. They may adopt a completely different slang and accent when speaking to someone of a different race, or of a similar race. This is not, however, a form of discrimination - it is considered casual and endearing. Phonology There are two vowels represented by the letter "e", i.e. e}}, {{IPA|ɛ}} and ə}}. Learners of Malay are expected to distinguish between the two sounds while learning each new word. In some parts of Peninsular Malaysia, especially in the central and southern region, most words which end with the letter a tends to be pronounced as ə}}. Borrowed words The Malay language has many words borrowed from Arabic (mainly religious terms), Hindustani, Sanskrit, Tamil, Portuguese, Dutch, certain Chinese dialects and more recently, English (in particular many scientific and technological terms). It has been said that there are only a handful of true malay words such as "Batu"(Rock). Some examples follow: Some Malay words have been borrowed into English. See the at Wiktionary, the free dictionary and Wikipedia's sibling project. Malay language has also heavily influenced the forms of colloquial English spoken in Malaysia (Manglish). Some simple phrases in Malay Usage among the younger generation While sending SMS messages on their mobile phones, or being logged into Internet chat rooms, Malay-speaking youths tend to abbreviate their words to save message space or simply be quick in sending their messages, e.g. x - tak, tidak (no; not); bkn - bukan (not); bleh - boleh (can, i.e. able to). They even alter the spellings of certain full words, e.g. ko - (eng)kau (you); ye - ya (yes). They even merge two words into a new one in place of a word of the same meaning in formal Malay, e.g. diorang (dia and orang). There is a new set of slangs spoken by the urban youth, which may not be familiar to the older generation, e.g. awek (girl); balak (guy); usya (survey); skodeng (peep); cun (pretty); poyo (horrible, low-quality) etc. The youth also tend to mix Malay with English words, forming Bahasa Rojak. Example of this pidgin is: Bestlah tempat ni (This place is cool);kau ni terror lah (How daring you are; you're fabulous). This issue has raised the displeasure of language purists in Malaysia, in their effort to uphold the proper use of the national language. See also | ||||||||
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