Creative Linguistic Philosophy

I was talking to a school teacher about the problem of teaching Maths and Science in English and also the concerns expressed by UMNO in particular Khairy's call for the subject to remain in Bahasa Malaysia.

She shake her head and quipped: "I hear students complained that they had difficulty in English, not Maths and Science in English."

I asked why. "Maybe it's because many students read the newspaper given by NST and from there they discovered that English is confusing as what they learn in school is not the same as what is applied outside and more so for the fact that our highest law-making authority who are suppose to be the leaders and should be leading by example is causing much confusion and contradiction.

For example, Deputy National Resources and Environment Minister Datuk S. Sothinathan was heard saying "Who is scared come and fight, lah... We, the MIC, are not scared." Everyone who watch the video at YouTube hear him clearly. He was angry and "Lawan" in an angry tone means fist fight. So, we can assume that an angry man is shouting to a lady MP and asking her for a fist fight. But Sothinathan said "I did not invite any of them to a fist fight. I used the term lawan (fight) in a political context. I told them to come and fight me at the next polls in my constituency or wherever the Barisan Nasional asked me to contest."

How is it that a "Lawan" which translate to "Fight" can mean "Contest a fight"?

I remembered some time ago, a report was lodged by theSun executive editor P. Gunasegaram against Jeff Ooi for carrying a posting which drew a response from someone who identify himself as Ilmran who wrote: “Somebody, please shoot this Gunasegaran for good.” Guna felt intimidated and alleged that he felt threatened and that that message was intended to shut him up.

In this incident, the English used, that's the word "shoot" was a threat and the person felt threatened as he believed that the word has a literal meaning, maybe, meant to shoot him.

But "Lawan" do not mean fist fight, says Sothi. Shoot must mean "shoot to kill"? many students are utterly confused. They felt that English is so difficult to understand, in particular, when words are spoken in Bahasa and needed to be translated. The circumstances when words are used and the body language should imply its intended meaning. However, observing the two cases, it's puzzling and senseless. On an occasion which is a parliamentary debate where two parties are shouting, the "fight" means "contest" and in a comment column on a blog, "shoot" was taken to have a literal meaning of which many of us would have thought it is said in a contextual aspect.

Let's take another case: The Bocor Remarks.

Datuk Mohd Said Yusof, the famed “Close-One-Eye” MP of Jasin, and Datuk Bung Mokhtar Radin, the MP for Kinabatangan, remarked in Parliament that Batu Gajah MP Fong Po Kuan leaks once a month. In justifying the two, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz who is also in charge of Parliamentary Affairs said the two MPs need not apologise to the lady MP because it was part of Parliamentary debates and both of them uttered words during a heated exchange and cannot control their emotion. “I am sure they didn’t have an agenda against Fong,” Nazri said.

So, what does it mean when two men shouted out loud saying "Fong leaks once a month"? Can any student try to contemplate the remarks as leaking roof or leaking anything else other than the once a month menstruation cycle? It wasn't the first time they had ridiculed the ladies in parliament. They had done it so often because they enjoyed immunity in parliament and they are from the ruling party which controls the majority of the votes and by precedence, no action will be taken against them nor will they be reprimanded for the fact that majority rules, and can do what they want, even if it's contemptuous.

All these controversies and creative interpretation are spoken by people held in high places and who are suppose to have characters and behaviors that are exemplary and intended for the younger generations to follow and learn. Surely, our younger generations have learned much and will follow suit. That's our society, and that's our culture. The leaders and law-makers have shown us the way. Malaysia Boleh!