Introduction: Aspects of regional varieties of Malay (original) (raw)

Journal of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society, 2020

This book provides an overview of the dialectal diversity of Malay spoken throughout the island of Sumatra. The contents gathered in the first decades of the 2000s include a combination of phonological, lexical, morphological and sociolinguistic data with a synchronic focus but with diachronic points of reference. It supported with maps and comparative tables of linguistic isoglosses and features.

Tom G. Hoogervorst - Some introductory notes on the development and characteristics of Sabah Malay

2011

This is a preliminary description of the Malay variety used as a lingua franca in the Malaysian state of Sabah at the northernmost top of Borneo. The paper discusses a number of common linguistic features that distinguish Sabah Malay from other Malay varieties and analyses these features from a historical linguistic perspective. While it is argued that Sabah Malay has a close historical relation with other Malay dialects spoken in Borneo, especially Brunei Malay, the vernacular is also influenced phonologically and lexically by Sabah's indigenous and immigrant speech communities. Words and sentences recorded or elicited during fieldwork in various parts of Sabah illustrate these points.

CALA 2019 - Paper 16-1 - The Malay Language in Mainland Southeast Asia

The CALA 2019 Proceedings, 2019

Today the Malay language is known to have communities of speakers outside the Malay archipelago, such as in Australia inclusive of the Christmas Islands and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands in the Indian Ocean (Asmah, 2008), the Holy Land of Mecca and Medina (Asmah et al. 2015), England, the Netherlands, France, and Germany. The Malay language is also known to have its presence on the Asian mainland, i.e. Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam. As Malays in these three countries belong to a minority, in fact among the smallest of the minorities, questions that arise are those that pertain to: (i) their history of settlement in the localities where they are now; (ii) the position of Malay in the context of the language policy of their country; and (iii) maintenance and shift of the ancestral and adopted languages.

Malay: its history, role and spread 1996

Draft. Official version appeared in: Atlas of languages of intercultural communication in the Pacific, Asia and the Americas. (S.A. Wurm, P. Mühlhäusler and D. Tryon eds.). Berlin: Mouton - de Gruyter., 1996

A sociolinguistic, historical and geographical overview of Indonesian/Malay in insular South-east Asia and elsewhere

Baba Malay Diverging trends in two ecologies

Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages, 2018

This article sheds light on the systematic differences between the variety of Baba Malay spoken in Malacca and that spoken in Singapore. In the literature , the creole is usually discussed as if it is a single homogeneous variety. Language documentation work conducted in both Malacca and Singapore shows that there are crucial differences between how Baba Malay is spoken in both places. These differences are systematic, and they pervade areas of morphology and syntax. All differences lead to the same conclusions. Evidence shows that the variety of Baba Malay in Malacca is much more heavily influenced by its lexifier, Malay, than the variety that is spoken in Singapore. Singapore Baba Malay is also more influenced by its substrate, Hokkien, than Malacca Baba Malay. This divergence between the two varieties is attributed to their specific ecologies. Crucially, the impetus for establishing two varieties of Baba Malay becomes even more vital than ever, given the fact that both varieties are highly endangered, and that researchers engaged in research on Baba Malay should be aware of both varieties and their social environments in order to fully represent the creole. [preprint]

North Moluccan Malay: Notes on a "Substandard" Dialect of Indonesian

Studies in Malay Dialects, Part II (J. Collins, ed.) NUSA Monograph Series, vol. 17. (Jakarta: Badan Penyelenggara Seri NUSA.), 1983

This paper identifies a high degree of multilingualism in at least one North Halmahera community (Wasile), based on a household survey. Following this, a number of topis concerning North Moluccan Malay are covered, ranging from phonology and affixation to pronouns and function words. Each of these parts of NMM grammar reflects the influence of indigenous languages, whether directly, in loanwords, or indirectly, by reshaping semantic categories, for example the deictic system. Three texts of a colloquial register of NMM with transliteration and translation are appended.

Malay dialects of the Batanghari river basin (Jambi, Sumatra)

2008

While the Malays of southeast Sumatra, beginning with the kingdoms of Melayu and Srivijaya in the 7th century, long dominated the vital trade links between India and China, the speech of their modern-day descendants remains poorly documented and subject to needless controversy. This study is a documentation of the speech of orang Jambi, the approximately one million Malays who live in the Batanghari river basin of Jambi Province, Sumatra, Indonesia. Motivated by Bronson's (1977) hypothesis that, in much of Southeast Asia, river systems are a key interpretive grid for understanding the region's history, the techniques of dialect geography and the historical-comparative method are used to map the present-day Malay dialects in this river basin and to demonstrate historical relationships among various Malay-speaking areas. Sixteen areas, two downstream and fourteen upstream, were sampled and their core vocabulary recorded using wordlists and texts. These data are analyzed using the comparative method, relying heavily on past reconstruction efforts, most notably that of Proto-Malayic by Adelaar (1992). Phonological innovations for these sixteen varieties are presented, and an effort is made to weigh the relative significance of the various innovations for the purposes of delineating dialects. The innovations in Jambi Malay varieties are also compared with those of neighboring speech varieties, such as Minangkabau, Kerinci, Kubu, Rawas and Serawai. It is concluded that there are at least six distinct Malay dialects in this area: Pesisir (Coastal) Malay (probably closely related to Riau Malay), a dialect labeled Jambi Ilir (Downstream) spoken in the capital area, a dialect labeled Jambi Ulu (Upstream) spoken in upstream areas, two Kubu dialects (Western and Eastern Jambi Kubu respectively) and a Penghulu dialect which classifies most closely with Minangkabau.

The Malayic-speaking Orang Laut: Dialects and Directions for Research

Wacana, Journal of the Humanities Vol. 14 No. 2, 2012

""Southeast Asia is home to many distinct groups of sea nomads, some of which are known collectively as Orang (Suku) Laut. Those located between Sumatra and the Malay Peninsula are all Malayic-speaking. Information about their speech is paltry and scattered; while starting points are provided in publications such as Skeat and Blagden (1906), Kähler (1946a; 1946b; 1960), Sopher (1977:178–180), Kadir et al. (1986), Stokhof (1987), Collins (1988) and Collins (1995), a comprehensive account and description of Malayic Sea Tribe lects has not been provided to date. This study brings together disparate sources, including a bit of original research, to sketch a unified linguistic picture and point the way for further investigation. While much is still unknown, this paper demonstrates relationships within and between individual Sea Tribe varieties and neighbouring canonical Malay lects. It is proposed that Sea Tribe lects can be assigned to four groupings: Kedah, Riau Islands, Duano and Sekak. Abstrak (Bahasa Indonesia) Asia Tenggara merupakan tempat menetap bagi kelompok Orang (Suku) Laut. Mereka yang tinggal di perairan antara pulau Sumatra dan Semenanjung Malaysia berbahasa rumpun Melayik. Informasi tentang bahasa yang digunakan oleh suku-suku ini sangat terbatas dan belum terkumpul dengan baik. Walaupun keterangan awal tersedia dalam penelitian-penelitian yang dipublikasikan oleh Skeat dan Blagden (1906), Kähler (1946a; 1946b; 1960), Sopher (1977:178–180), Kadir et al. (1986), Stokhof (1987), Collins (1988) dan Collins (1995), pemetaan dan deskripsi yang menyeluruh tentang variasi bahasa Suku Laut Melayik ini belum tersedia sampai sekarang. Penelitian ini mencoba untuk menyatukan seluruh sumber informasi yang tersebar mengenai bahasa suku tersebut dengan mengikutsertakan penelitian pokok sebagai upaya untuk memberikan gambaran linguistik terpadu dan arahan untuk penelitian selanjutnya. Lepas dari kenyataan bahwa masih banyak hal yang belum terungkap, makalah ini menunjukkan keterkaitan baik antara masing-masing variasi bahasa Suku Laut dan juga relasi masing-masing variasi bahasa itu dengan variasi-variasi bahasa Melayu di sekitarnya. Variasi bahasa Suku Laut itu dapat dibagi ke dalam empat rumpun dialek: Melayu Kedah, Suku Laut Kepulauan Riau, Duano dan Sekak.""

Malay Dialect Variants in Langkawi: A Diachronic Perspective Analysis

Journal of Nusantara Studies (JONUS)

Background and Purpose: Dialectical studies scrutinised the closeness, kinship or genealogy of dialects derived from a language. Previous scholars divide Malay dialects in Peninsular Malaysia into four main clusters. The first cluster are the Johor-Melaka-Selangor and Central Perak. The second cluster is a group that spreads from the Patani region covering the Patani-Kelantan-Terengganu dialect. The third is the Negeri Sembilan cluster, and the fourth is the Kedah dialect. Generally, the Kedah dialect is divided into seven groups, covering Kedah (including Langkawi), Perlis, Penang and northern Perak Taiping. This study aims to investigate the Malay dialect variants in Langkawi Island via the Historical Linguistics approach and qualitative comparison research design. Methodology: This study utilised the qualitative research method. A total of 23 native speakers of Langkawi Malay dialect participated in this study. These informants were selected using NORM (an acronym for non-mobil...

Salako or Badameà, sketch grammar, texts and lexicon of a Kanayatn dialect in West Borneo (review)

Oceanic Linguistics, 2007

The Salako language, spoken in parts of West Kalimantan and Sarawak, is accepted as belonging to the Malayic family (Adelaar 1992a), but despite this linguistic af²liation, Salako speakers are culturally far removed from present-day Malay groups in Western Indonesia due to the preservation to their traditional lifestyle and religion until relatively recently. The Salako are, of course, not the only "Dayak" people of Kalimantan to be counted in the Malayic family; other such groups include the Iban and the Kendayan. But in contrast to the better-documented Iban language, Salako had not received suf²cient attention from linguists prior to Adelaar's earlier publications, especially in regard to grammar and morphology. The present grammar thus represents the ²rst attempt at offering a more holistic picture of the Salako language, and ²lls an important gap in our knowledge of the Malayic family and the linguistic landscape of West Kalimantan. The grammar, however, as stated in the title, is only a sketch. It covers the fundamental points of the phonology and morphology of the language along with a basic picture of the syntax. The bulk of the book comprises a collection of texts in Salako with English translations and a lexicon. It is the product of Adelaar's ²eldwork in Nyarumkop, a Roman Catholic parochial center located in the Singkawang Timur district, Benkayang regency, where he collected data intermittently between the late 1980s and 2004. In what follows, I review the content and presentation of this publication while at the same time highlighting some points of Salako grammar that are of importance for current issues in linguistics. The relevance of Salako to the reconstruction and subgrouping of Malayic has already been dealt with by Adelaar in several articles (Adelaar 1992a, 1992b, 2004, 2005b). The book is organized into four parts. Part i is an introduction containing basic information about the speaker community, the history of Salako scholarship, and the recent sociolinguistic situation. Part ii is a sketch grammar with subsections covering phonology, morphophonology, and morphosyntax. Part iii consists of 20 texts that are mostly narrated stories, procedural texts, and stories explaining Salako customs with a few samples of dialogue included. Part iv, the ²nal part, is a Salako-English lexicon. The introduction is well written and informative, enriched by Adelaar's longstanding interest in the language area in particular, and in the Malayic family more generally. We are told here about the various linguistic pressures affecting Salako speakers today, the greatest of which is from Indonesian, as is evident from the code-mixing within the texts. This pressure is not new; in earlier times, Adelaar informs us, the Catholic church was responsible for the marginalization of Salako by their promotion of Malay as the of²cial liturgical language. In regard to classi²cation, Adelaar locates Malayic in the framework of his Malayo-Sumbawan hypothesis (Adelaar 2005a) which groups Madurese, Sundanese, Sasak, Sumbawa, Balinese, Chamic, and Malayic into a single subgroup of Malayo-Polynesian.

Tracing the Malays in the Malay Land

This article is an attempt to reconstruct and explain the origin of the Malays based on compatible reality. The sources of this article consist of the resources that were used in the well-known written work on this topic, but also a revelation was made upon it. Basic explanations in this article are from the indigenous classical writings, which become the primary sources. This article proposes that the search for the origins of the Malays can be traced based on ancient languages, archaeology, anthropology materials, a physical fossil, genetic and historical resources. The origin of the word Malay and the features of the Malays are discussed too.

Contact of Dialect Clusters: The Malay Peninsula and Sumatera

Open Journal of Modern Linguistics, 2015

Contact between speakers of clusters of Malay dialects of the Malay Peninsula and Sumatera has been going on from historical times until today. This study discusses contacts as reflected in the literary genres of the syair and the hikayat. A research was conducted on a real life situation of the contact of the Bengkulu dialect cluster of Sumatera and that of the southern peninsula Malay dialect in a Bengkulu settler community in the latter region, to assess the receptivity of the speakers of the minority settler community of the norms of the host region. The findings showed that although there was adaptation on the part of the minority community, it did not come readily. Norms that determine the preferred use and usage of language, as well as the social pragmatics of adaptation are the motivating factors for acceptance. Stability of the minority as part of a larger community leads to uninhibited awareness of the traditions of the (former's) parent community, which in turn motivates a regeneration of erstwhile practices.