My parents speak at least 3 languages each; I can barely manage my mother tongue. What went wrong?
Like her polyglot parents, millennial Jillian Lim has socialised with people of many races and ethnicities all her life. She interrogates why this exposure hasn't made her more proficient with a variety of languages and dialects.
Jillian Lim, a millennial, grew up with parents who spoke multiple languages. Her father was Hainanese and her mother Eurasian. They frequently switched to Malay when they didn't want her and her sister to understand them, mostly gossiping about relatives and friends. Jillian could understand Malay after years of exposure, but they never practiced speaking it.
Singapore has long been bilingual, with English as the main language of instruction since 1987. In Jillian's generation, multilingualism is less common compared to older generations who grew up speaking multiple languages, including their family language and another language or dialect. Prime Minister Lawrence Wong encouraged Singaporeans to learn Malay and appreciate Malay culture, sparking conversations about language learning in the country.
Written by urgent.news from Channel News Asia's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
