Social Variation Of Malay Language In Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia: A Study On Accent, Identity And Integration

Abstract

Language variation is conveyed through its regional or social dimension. In line with thatproposition, this paper discusses the social variation of Malay language spoken inKuching, Sarawak, Malaysia focussing on their accents. As part of the Malay languagesociety, the Malays of Kuching have their own accent which is different from otherMalay accents or the standard national accent. This paper analyzes the status of nationalstandard accent and non-standard accent among the Malay informants in the city ofKuching. The discussion is based on a sociological urban dialectology research. For theanalysis, five phonological variables are chosen. They are open-ended vowels (a), such askita ‘we’, close-ended (i), such bilik ‘room’, close-ended (u), such as masuk ‘enter’,initial (r) or (r)1, such as rumah ‘home’, and final (r) or (r)2, such as pasar ‘market’.Issues on accents are studied through four different degree of formality of speech styles,namely reading word list style (WLS), reading passage style (PS), conversational style(CS) and story-telling style (STS). Three social contextual variables - socio-economicstatus, sex, and age groups of the informants will be considered in the analysis. The useof national standard accent compared with the non-standard accent will be linked toissues of identity and integration.