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Inclusion, exclusion, and racial identity in Singapore's language education system
Author(s) -
Starr Rebecca Lurie,
Hiramoto Mie
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
international journal of applied linguistics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.712
H-Index - 39
eISSN - 1473-4192
pISSN - 0802-6106
DOI - 10.1111/ijal.12242
Subject(s) - malay , enthusiasm , heritage language , ambivalence , ethnic group , inclusion (mineral) , first language , identity (music) , gender studies , government (linguistics) , political science , variety (cybernetics) , minority language , population , sociology , psychology , linguistics , pedagogy , social psychology , demography , law , physics , artificial intelligence , acoustics , computer science , philosophy
The multiethnic population of Singapore speaks a wide variety of languages, only four of which hold official status. We consider sociolinguistic issues that arise in connection with Singapore's Mother Tongue (MT) education policy, in which children are assigned a course of language study based on their racial heritage. A survey of Singaporeans from various backgrounds indicates that those of mixed and/or minority heritage do not identify strongly with their assigned MT. Respondents of Chinese heritage differ considerably in their attitudes by ethnolinguistic background; overall, they show more ambivalence towards their assigned MT than respondents of Malay and Indian heritage. Our findings reflect the legacies of Singapore's government language campaigns, as well as a growing enthusiasm among Singaporeans for languages that index distinctive regional ethnic identities.