Indonesian vs Malaysian

blanche   Wed Sep 16, 2009 10:23 am GMT
Most Chinese Malaysians dislike the language. They are forced to learn it. It can be strange or even weird to see two Chinese Malaysians talking in Malay. Many Malays don't seem to respect their own language either. They like to switch to English from time to time or use a lot of English words even when they speak Malay

Why?? This is terrible!
Wong   Wed Sep 16, 2009 4:23 pm GMT
<< Most Chinese Malaysians dislike the language. They are forced to learn it. It can be strange or even weird to see two Chinese Malaysians talking in Malay. Many Malays don't seem to respect their own language either. They like to switch to English from time to time or use a lot of English words even when they speak Malay. >>

Yes. I noticed that as well.

Now I understand why, considering:
1) the education system in Malaysia, where children are separated according to "race" quite early
2) the close connection between Malay language and the Malay ethnicity and thus Islam
3) that Malays themselves not respecting their own language that much

The situation is vastly different in Indonesia.
As I said, Indonesian is one of a few things that quite successfully unite Indonesians that are otherwise very diverse.

In Indonesia most Chinese speak Indonesian among themselves. One of the main reasons is because there is no linguistic segregation in the education system like in Malaysia, and Indonesian is certainly NOT associated with a certain religion or ethnic group.
Wong   Fri Sep 18, 2009 12:10 am GMT
Back to the language! ^^

Another minor difference between Malay and Indonesian:
M: cuba
I: coba
38   Fri Sep 18, 2009 2:34 am GMT
In Malaysia, especially West Malaysia, if a word ends in an 'a', it's usually pronounced 'ə' (the schwa sound).

Examples:

mana - mɑ:nə
apa - ɑ:pə
cuba - cubə
kenapa - kənɑ:pə
jaga - jɑ:gə
kereta - kəretə

I believe this is never done in Indonesia.

Strangely enough, when they speak English, they do the opposite - they always avoid and change the schwa sound, which is the most common sound in English, and this makes their English sound like Malay.

Examples:

sofa - they pronounce it /sɒ 'fɑ:/ instead of /'səʊ fə/
Coca Cola - /gɒ 'gɑ: gɒ 'lɑ:/ instead of /.kəʊ kə 'kəʊ lə/
computer - /gɒm bju: 'dɜ:/ instead of /kəm 'pju: tə(r)/
photo - /fɒ 'dɒ/ instead of /'fəʊ təʊ/
tomato - /dɒ mɑ: 'dɒ/ instead of /tə 'mɑ: təʊ/
Wong   Fri Sep 18, 2009 9:00 pm GMT
That is pretty well known in Indonesia. :)
In Indonesia there are traditionally dialects that do the same thing (turning final A into schwa), but this has been declining due to the influence of standard Indonesian.
The Padang dialect is known for pronouncing final -A as -O, just like in Occitan.
mana - mano
apa - apo
coba - cubo
kenapa - kənapo

Some other things that we do when we're trying to imitate Malaysian accent:
°Dropping the R, and sometimes using an English R.
°"Stopping" the final -K.
°Changing second syllable U to O.
°Changing the intonation. IMO, Malaysians generally sound more "Chinese" and use lots of glottal stops.

Note that all of these characteristics also exist in some dialects in Indonesia.

besar > besaa
sabar > sabaa
kasar > kasaa
tidak > ta'
anak > ana'
budak (=slave in Indonesian) > buda' (=boy, guy)
suruh sounding more like suroh
turut sounding more like turo't


I didn't know that Malaysians do the opposite when speaking English. Thanks!
Adrian   Wed Oct 21, 2009 7:49 am GMT
"Most Chinese Malaysians dislike the language. They are forced to learn it. It can be strange or even weird to see two Chinese Malaysians talking in Malay. Many Malays don't seem to respect their own language either. They like to switch to English from time to time or use a lot of English words even when they speak Malay"

I agree with this. As a Malaysian Chinese, I have never seen two Chinese conversing with each other in Malay. Among the younger generation, Mandarin is first, then probably dialect (Hokkien, Cantonese), then maybe English for urban Chinese. Malay is only used when dealing with the government, in school, or when talking to Malays.

I don't think its that Chinese don't respect the language, but in Malaysia, racial distinctions are very strong and Bahasa Melayu (Malay Language) is implied to 'belong' to the Malays. Even the idea of changing it to Bahasa Malaysia (Malaysian Language) was met with stiff opposition from Malay purists who saw it as an attack on their position.
random malaysian   Fri Nov 13, 2009 9:21 am GMT
I agree with the statement that the Malay language is almost always associated (by most non-Malay Malaysians at least) with the Malay race. I think that by renaming it Bahasa Malaysia, the government is trying to replicate to some degree what was done in Indonesia. IMO the segregation is already prominent and will only change if the establishment of the separate schools -Chinese, Indian (Tamil), and National (Malay) is halted. Until that happens, With there being schools that are completely "Chinese" with Mandarin being the medium of instruction (the same goes for Tamil), I don't see any chance of Malay being accepted as a primary language for all Malaysians.

Back to what the topic at hand. I have never been able to understand spoken Indonesian when I watch Indonesian movies or tv shows. I can somewhat predict the meaning of the conversation but the factors that hinder my understanding are the different words and,the accent, and the fact that it is always spoken extremely fast (to my ears at least). Songs, on the other hand, are a no brainer for me to understand. Whether this is because most of them are sung slowly, or they are singing it in a 'neutral' accent, whether on purpose or not (to widen their fanbase to malaysia, singapore, or brunei) , I have no idea. But the BI songs i've heard so far sound to me almost identical to what I consider to be regular Malay.

I've been to Indonesia on holidays before. Had no problem understanding Indonesians there. Most probably due to them restraining their full use of colloquialisms, slang, etc. So all in all, It may be mutually intelligible to some degree, but one needs alot of exposure to it to listen to a conversation and understand it without any thinking involved.
Wong   Tue Nov 17, 2009 3:01 am GMT
Thanks a lot for your replies Adrian and random malaysian.

The association of the national language with a certain race, religion, ethnicity, or culture in Indonesia is practically nonexistant.

Everybody speaks Indonesian, no matter what their ethnicity or religion is.

Of course there are regional or ethnic languages or dialects like Bahasa Jawa, Bahasa Sunda, Bahasa Hokkien, Bahasa Ambon, etc. But Bahasa Indonesia is de facto and de jure the neutral way of communication in Indonesia.
Wong   Tue Nov 17, 2009 3:06 am GMT
Which reminds me: I think this is one of the main differences between people of Chinese descent in Malaysia and Indonesia.

The Chinese Malaysians prefer Chinese, and many of them aren't fluent in Malay, whereas most of Chinese Indonesians are fluent in Indonesian, often to the point that they don't really speak Chinese anymore.
Wong   Tue Nov 17, 2009 3:09 am GMT
After all, the Chinese Indonesians themselves said that someone who speaks Bahasa Hokkien doesn't understand someone who speaks Bahasa Khek. And that there are numerous dialects of Chinese which are too different from each other. Thus they use Indonesian instead to communicate with each other.
38   Tue Nov 17, 2009 4:13 am GMT
I've noticed that some Chinese Indonesians do speak some Mandarin. Is it true to say that more and more Chinese Indonesians are learning to speak Mandarin or maybe even use Mandarin as a lingua franca among the Chinese community like what they do among the Chinese Malaysians?
Wong   Wed Nov 18, 2009 3:36 am GMT
Learning Mandarin is being promoted.
Yet those people who do learn it as a foreign language, and day to day communication is still carried out mainly in Indonesian.
I doubt that Mandarin will ever become the lingua franca among Chinese Indonesians, but you never know..
Wong   Thu Nov 19, 2009 4:48 am GMT
Another interesting difference

modern
Malay: moden
Indonesian: modérn
random malaysian   Fri Nov 20, 2009 2:06 am GMT
actually what struck me as interesting was common everyday words that differ in malay and indonesian.

kerana-karena, boleh-bisa, berbeza-berbeda, etc. i wonder how these changes came about and if they were the same at some point in history.

btw, i can never get used to the word 'bisa' replacing boleh because the meaning of 'bisa' in malay (and the meaning that comes to mind everytime i hear it) is poison =) have to get used to it more.

malay is, btw, more or less the neutral language of malaysia. before the advent of mandarin in malaysia, chinese malaysians used to speak (depending on where they lived and what their ancestors spoke) Cantonese, Hokkien, Hakka, etc. The only way to communicate with each other was using Bahasa.

Even now, if two Malaysians (regardless of race) meet and don't speak the same language, they can always fall back on Bahasa to converse. Unlike Indonesian, it isn't a first choice, but it still makes Malay indispensible imo.
Wong   Fri Nov 20, 2009 5:11 am GMT
"Bisa" also means "poison" in Indonesian.
I don't really know the history of "bisa" in the meaning of "be able to" either. In most dialects, "boleh" is used, and the *old* meaning of "boleh" can still be seen in fixed phrases or sentences like "Apa boleh buat?".

Btw, do you guys in Malaysia also use "buat" in the meaning of "untuk"?


Are you sure that Malaysians of different races always fall back to Bahasa Melayu?
It seems that a good number of Malaysians prefer English to speak with each other.