We Have to Live a Language to Use it

by Janadas Devan

'THO' I call them Mine, I know that they are not Mine.'

The English critic F.R. Leavis liked to cite that remark of William Blake about his works to point to the essential impersonality of literature: Blake 'meant that when the artist is creatively successful, the creativity to which the achievement belongs is not his, though, while transcending the person he is, it needed his devoted and supremely responsible service,' Leavis wrote.

 'The creative power and purpose don't reside within his personal self-enclosure; they are not his property or in his possession. He serves them, not they him.'

The same can be said of the relationship each of us has to whatever language we speak: 'Tho' I call it Mine, I know that it is not Mine.'

For one thing, every language pre-dates our own existence - by many thousands of years in the case of ancient languages, like Chinese, Tamil or Persian. Every child that gains access to a language, gains access to a pre-existing order of meaning. A language speaks us long before we learn to speak it.

For another, every language is through and through a communal artefact. As the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein has established, there can be no such thing as a 'private language'.

For to speak a language is to participate above all in a 'form of life', as he puts it. To share in that form, one must first be trained to share in it. And that training must necessarily be public, for there cannot be private access to a 'form of life'. Every word in every language must first be understood by a community of speakers before it can be uttered meaningfully by anyone. The meaning is prior to the utterance; the public comes before the personal. 'Tho' I call these words Mine, I know that they are not Mine.'

Now, these are all obvious points, but how often do we remember them? Language is only a tool, many of us are inclined to believe. Choosing the language to concentrate on mastering - English or Chinese, Malay or English - is just an economic decision. To attach emotions to that decision is, well, emotional, if not outright chauvinistic. English-educated cosmopolitans, especially, tend to regard the concerns of the Chinese-educated about the fate of Chinese in Singapore in this way.

It is a profound misunderstanding. Yes, emotions are involved, but they are not necessarily irrational merely because they are emotions. Yes, the language chauvinists will always be with us - there are many among the English-educated, too - but devotion to any particular language does not invariably involve dislike of other languages.

What the worries of the Chinese-educated spring from is a devotion to a particular 'form of life'. Since language is inseparable from its form of life, it is inconceivable that any change in the use of a language will not affect the form of life in which it is embedded.

When the Chinese-educated express worry that Chinese standards may be diluted in Singapore, they are expressing concerns for a form of life that is at once personal as well as impersonal, rooted in the present as well as deeply historical.

Malay and Indian MPs who expressed worry in Parliament this week over the decreasing popularity of Malay and Tamil, especially among the more educated members of their communities, did so for similar reasons.

 'Tho' I call this language Mine, I know that it is not Mine.' The 'not Mine' here refers to the perceptions and values, the intimations and insights embedded in the 'forms of life' to which every language is linked.

But the reality in Singapore is those 'forms of life' are becoming attenuated. According to figures released in Parliament, half the cohort of Chinese pupils entering Primary 1 now come from English-speaking homes. No figures were released for Malay and Indian pupils, but their proportion is likely to be similar, if not higher.

It is unrealistic to expect that such pupils will acquire a high degree of facility in their 'mother tongues', no matter how able they are. Learning a language is not like learning trigonometry. We apply trigonometry; we think and feel through language. We don't have to live trigonometry in order to use it; we have to live a language in order to use it.

The Chinese language teaching reforms that Parliament has approved take realistic account of the current state of affairs - and hopefully, by being realistic, will serve to shore up bilingualism. Similar reforms will probably have to be undertaken for the other 'mother tongues'.

For an increasing number of Singaporeans, their 'mother tongue' will effectively be their 'second tongue'. They will not be able to fully occupy the 'form of life' associated with that tongue, but they may be able to visit without feeling totally out of place.

The Government hopes at least 5-10 per cent of each cohort will acquire enough facility in their mother tongues to constitute a 'core' of highly proficient users of those languages. Will that be enough to maintain the 'forms of life' linked to each of these languages?

Realistically, there is no alternative to accepting that only a few people can be highly proficient in more than one language. For better or worse - and on balance, it is considerably better than for worse - Singapore has to be a multilingual society. English will not disappear as the language of business and government; and most Singaporeans will be effectively bilingual to one degree or another.

We have no alternative but to live out bicultural 'forms of life'.