South Asian languages in Singapore
South Asian languages in Singapore are mainly used by the country's 348,119 Indian Singaporean residents, who form about 9.2% of Singaporean citizens and permanent residents.[1] As a result of historical migration and settlement patterns, Indian Singaporeans came to the island from various parts of South Asia speaking a variety of South Asian languages, mostly Tamil. Today, most ethnic Indians in Singapore are locally born second, third, fourth or even fifth generation descendants of immigrant forefathers. In addition, a substantial minority are recent immigrants from the Indian subcontinent.
In Singapore, a distinction is made between the ancestral ethno-linguistic identity of a person and the actual language that he or she uses or is able to use. Singapore's census takers make this distinction by capturing both types of data. Ancestral ethno-linguistic identity is captured under the category of 'dialect group' (although this term may be more appropriate for describing the linguistic composition of the majority Chinese, rather than Indians). In contrast, actual language use is captured by the term'language most frequently spoken at home'.
The various government statistics only refer to residents (citizens and permanent residents) and exclude those classed as "non-residents" who represent about 25% of the total population (mostly foreign students and workers).
Ethno-linguistic profile
In 2010, the
The percentages in the table refer to the proportion of each language group within the larger Resident Indian community in Singapore.
Ethno-linguistic background | Ancestral home | Religion | 2010 census | Percentage |
---|---|---|---|---|
Tamil
|
Tamil Nadu Sri Lanka Puducherry |
Hinduism, Islam, Christianity | 188,591 | 54.18% |
Malayali
|
Kerala Lakshadweep |
Hinduism, Islam, Christianity | 26,348 | 7.57% |
Punjabi
|
Punjab
|
Sikhism, Hinduism | 18,624 | 5.35% |
Gujarati | Gujarat | Hinduism, Islam, Jainism | 4,124 | 1.18% |
Sindhi
|
Sindh | Hinduism | 3,971 | 1.14% |
Sinhalese | Sri Lanka | Buddhism | 3,140 | 0.90% |
Parsi
Other Indians/Mixed[Note 1] |
Andhra Pradesh Telangana Bengal Goa Various |
Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Zoroastrianism | 103,321 | 29.68% |
348,119 | 100% |
- ^ Singaporeans of mixed ethnicity typically identify with their paternal ethnic group.
Singapore's Indian community is characterised by an ethnic Tamil majority (54.18%) and a large number of smaller groups. Ethnic
Language use
According to the 2005 General Household Survey, Tamil was spoken at home by 3.1% of all Singapore residents. Among Indians residents, 38.8% used Tamil at home. As 58.3% of Indians were deemed to be ethnic Tamils in the 2000 census, this suggests that two-thirds of ethnic Tamils in Singapore used it as the main language in their homes.
11.4% of Indians spoke 'other languages' at home (including non-Tamil Indian languages). In contrast, 41.7% of Indians were deemed to be non-Tamil Indians in 2000. Assuming that most Indians who reported speaking 'other languages' were referring to their (non-Tamil) ancestral languages, this would imply that up to a quarter of non-Tamil Indians in Singapore use mainly their ancestral language in the home.
About half of Indians in Singapore predominantly use a non-Indian language in the home. 39% spoke mainly English, in contrast to 28.1% nationally. This made English the most spoken language in Indian homes, by a small margin. A further 10.6% of Indians reported speaking mainly Malay in their homes. It is likely that most are Indian Muslims married to ethnic Malays. Although they are counted as Indian in official statistics, a substantial number of these people consider themselves to be ethnically and culturally Malay, and many of them may be racially mixed.
Tamil language in Singapore
Tamil is the most spoken Indian language in Singapore and the only Indian language among Singapore's
As part of Singapore's bilingual education policy, Tamil is offered as a second language option in most public schools. As part of a policy to subsidise minority-language television programming, the government subsidises a
Singapore has a commercially run Tamil language daily newspaper,
Tamil movies are screened in some cinemas, with the Rex Cinemas chain specializing in them. Major blockbusters are occasionally shown in selected Cathay and Golden Village cinemas. The country also has a Tamil theatre scene in the form of groups like Agni Koothu and the Ravindran Drama Group. There is also a small Tamil literary scene. Two Tamil language writers and two Tamil language theatre practitioners have won Cultural Medallions, the nation's highest arts award. Tamil is used in temples, mosques and churches catering to the community. Some business and non-profit groups, especially those in the Little India neighbourhood, use Tamil on a daily basis.
Other Indian languages
This section needs additional citations for verification. (March 2008) |
Since 1990, public school students were able to take Hindi or some other Indian languages as their second language in major examinations, whereas previously only official languages like Tamil were offered.[5] Students of other non-Tamil Indian language communities can choose to offer Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Punjabi or Urdu as their Mother-Tongue at the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) and the GCE ‘N’, ‘O’ and ‘A’ level examinations Mother-Tongue Language Policy. As with the Tamil community, the other Indian communities also support a number of community groups for the promotion of social and cultural activities catering to each community. For more on this, see Jain & Wee (2018, 2019).
Influence on other local languages
Given the long period of contact between India and the region, as well as the multifarious contact over the centuries between Britain, India, Malaya and China (especially Hong Kong), Indian influences have crept into a variety on non-Indian Singapore languages through a number of paths -
- Hokkien and Mandarin), are terms which were originally Indian loan words. These include 'suka' (or 'happiness'), 'roti' (or 'bread'), and 'sama' (or 'same'). In addition, there are words in the English that are derived from Malay, but which in turn are derived from Sanskrit originals[citation needed]. These include such words as camphor and mandarin.
- Ancient and colonial-era gunny sack, coolie.
- The influence of Indian teachers of English in Singapore schools, who brought elements of Indian English pronunciation, syntax, etc. into Singapore English. Dr Adam Brown, a professor of phonetics and linguistics, writes "It may surprise many readers to think that Singapore English is heavily influenced by Indian English. However, English had been spoken in India for at least a century before Raffles established Singapore for the East India Company in 1819, and Singapore was administered as part of India for most of the 19th century. Also, as Ho & Platt (1993) and Gupta (1994) note, many teachers in Singapore were of Indian origin. Between 1920 and 1940, for example, there were similar numbers of Indian and European teachers in English-medium schools in Singapore, and Indians have always been well represented in the teaching profession."[6]
Notes
- ^ Singapore Department of Statistics (2007). Monthly Digest of Statistics Singapore, October 2007 (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-11-24. Retrieved 2008-01-06 – via singstat.gov.sg.
- ISBN 978-981-08-7808-5. Archived from the original(PDF) on 2020-02-13. Retrieved 2018-09-28.
- ^ "Country Profile". www.sg. Archived from the original on 2007-12-13. Retrieved 2007-12-13.
- ^ Key Indicators of the Resident Population (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on September 19, 2007. Retrieved September 19, 2007 – via singstat.gov.sg.
- ^ Lal, p.187.
- ^ Brown, p. viii
References
- Jain, R., & Wee, L. (2019). Diversity management and the presumptive universality of categories: the case of the Indians in Singapore. Current Issues in Language Planning, 20(1), 16–32.
- Jain, R. & Wee. L. (2018). Cartographic mismatches and language policy: The case of Hindi in Singapore. Language Policy, 17 (1), 99–118.
- Brown, Adam (1999). Singapore English in a Nutshell: An Alphabetical Description of its Features. Singapore: Federal Publications. ISBN 981-01-2435-X.
- Lal, Brij V.; Peter Reeves; Rajesh Rai, eds. (2006). The Encyclopedia of the Indian Diaspora. Singapore: Editions Didier Millet in association with ISBN 981-4155-65-9.