history of english 2

• Longue duree

  • Deepest level of historical time, covering the long-term structures and continuities that endure over centuries or even long period of time. 
  • It includes things like geography, climate, sociopolitical system and long-standing cultural practices. 
  • Braudel argued that these underlying factors exerted a fundamental influence on human societies, shaping their development over the long term.
• Court duree

  • Traditional view of history that focuses on short-term events and individual actions. 
  • It includes things like wars, political revolutions, and significant events. 
  • Braudel saw these as merely the surface of historical processes.
• Flow of time ought to be understood as multi-layered where different timescales are intertwined and overlapping in the lives of people
• Many concepts of linguistics

  Point to Braudel concept of time
• The Braudel concept of time is applicable and similar to many other disciplines and studies of human experience
• Mainstream linguistics has not fully engaged with or incorporated a rich historical concept of time into the analytical toolkit
• Mainstream linguistics has taken for granted the notion of history and analysed snapshots of linguistic data
• Historical linguistics seems to only look at artifacts in the past
• We should not take for granted the stability of text as simply old in changing traditions, meaning, and effects
• We should investigate texts as intertwined, parts of historical long flows of time
• Recognise and understand


  • Social structures of ideologies and power
  • How they are practiced
  • When they are used
  • Where they originated from
• Uncover


  • The real historical agents behind these ideologies
  • Using research methods such as ethnography
• Ideologies that circulate


  Become significant tool for people to wield power, express their interests and form alliance
• Focus


  1. Find out how our linguistic resources are created

  2. Spread

  3. Valued within society

  4. Examine the mechanisms involved in their production such as circulation, production, distribution

  5. Significance attached to them
• How English developed in Singapore schools during its time as a British colony

  1. British established itself in Penang

  2. Raffles founded Singapore

  3. British took over Malacca from the Dutch

  4. Penang, Malacca and Singapore established as Straits Settlements (with Singapore as capital)
• Bazaar Malay


  The language usually spoken by people
• How English rose in importance to rival Malay

  1. Influx of Chinese immigrants who could only speak Chinese

  2. Malay forming the population gradually decreased with time to 25% in 1931

  3. Increased varied background of students due to immigration meant that the youngest children in schools seldom had knowledge of Malay as lingua franca

  4. English started to take over Malay
• Bazaar Malay


  A contact variety with influences from Chinese languages
• Language contact


  When 2 or more varieties of language interact and influence each other
• Singlish


  Exhibits characteristics of English and some other characteristics
• Creoles


  Typically arise in multilingual environments where speakers of different languages come into contact and need a common means of communication
• Singlish


  • Mixed vocabulary, such as Malay, Chinese dialects etc
  • Simplified grammar influenced by grammar structure of other spoken languages in Singapore
  • Language mixing, code switching
• Standard English has typically been consistent throughout the years
• How English became the most valuable language in Singapore

  • Bilingual policy - students learn English and mother tongue
  • English chosen due to economic value, racial neutrality, and allowing inter-ethnic communication
  • Only 1 mother tongue per official racial group to build social cohesion and nation building
• How standard English and Singlish co-exist in Singapore society

  With prevalent ideologies about each variety
• Attitudes and valuations towards English varieties

  • Uniform
  • Contested
• Standard English


  • Most prestigious and valuable language
  • Linked to socioeconomic attainment
  • Ideologies largely uncontested and uniform
  • Positioned by government as economic tool to plug into global economy
• Singlish


  • Government fears it
  • Speak Good English movement aimed to eradicate it but was impractical
  • Older Singaporeans see it as bad English, younger Singaporeans see it as marker of national identity and language of informality/intimacy
• Singlish has complex rules to make words and sentences, e.g. placing lah/meh
• Standard English and Singlish are two separate dialects of English with their own grammar and rules used in different contexts, language variation does not mean one variety is better than the other
• Research shows Singlish can be used in the classroom as a resource to help students acquire the standard form
• Research shows even school children from a mainstream school can differentiate and switch between Standard English and Singlish appropriately
• Are singaporeans native speaker of english?

  Expertise: demonstrating high proficiency in the language 

  Affiliation: Having one’s sense of cultural identity linked to the language 

  Inheritance : Growing up with language, having it being transmitted from parent to child 
• Phases of development in Singapore education system

  1. Survival driven phase (1950s to early 80s)

  2. Efficiency driven phase (mid 80s to late 90s)

  3. Ability driven phase (late 90s to early 2000s)

  4. Aspiration driven phase (mid 2000s onwards)
• Survival driven phase


  Country was focused on education for the masses. Needed people to fill jobs in labour-intensive mass manufacturing industries
• Efficiency driven phase


  Focused on industry's shift to more capital-intensive industries. Differentiation/streaming according to academic abilities, express teams etc, gifted programmes
• Ability driven phase


  Focused on developing each individual to his/her fullest potential. Shift to knowledge-based economy, more subject combinations students take in school
• Aspiration driven phase


  Focus on individual choice and aspirations. Broad-based education; multiple routes to success (SOTA, Sports School etc)
• How do we teach/learn english in singapore?
• Exonormative trends in EL pedagogy

  We tend to follow teaching practices from outside of SG especially the west