| MALAY LANGUAGE
If you are looking for a translator from
Malay or into Malay, we are please to offer
the service of our extensive pool of Malay
linguists to match your needs.
Our areas of expertise include Advertising
& PR, Technology & Engineering,
Law & Litigation Support, Banking &
Finance, Medical & Health, Automotive
& Aerospace, Food & Agriculture,
Extractive Industries, Personal Documents
and many other.
SOME FACTS
The Malay language is an Austronesian language
spoken by the Malay people who are native
to the Malay peninsula, southern Thailand,
Singapore, central eastern Sumatra, the
Riau islands, and parts of the coast of
Borneo. It is the official language of Malaysia
and Brunei, and is one of four official
languages of Singapore. It is also used
as a working language in East Timor. It
is practically the same as or mutually intelligible
with Bahasa Indonesia, the official language
of Indonesia, but differentiated in name
for political reasons.
The official standard for Malay, as agreed
upon by Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei,
is Bahasa Riau, the language of the Riau
Archipelago, long considered the birthplace
of the Malay language.
In Malaysia, it is known as Bahasa Melayu
or Bahasa Malaysia, which means the Malay,
or Malaysian, language. The latter term,
which was introduced by the National Language
Act 1967, was predominant until the 1990s,
when most academics and government officials
reverted to the older term, which is used
in the Malay version of the Federal Constitution.
Indonesia adopted a form of Malay as its
official language upon independence, naming
it Bahasa Indonesia. In Singapore and Brunei
it is known simply as Malay or Bahasa Melayu.
The reason for adopting these terms is political
rather than a reflection of linguistic distinctiveness,
as standard Bahasa Malaysia and Bahasa Indonesia
are mutually intelligible. However, many
Malay dialects are not as mutually intelligible:
e.g. Kelantanese pronunciation is difficult
even for some Malaysians to understand,
while Javanese Malay tends to have a lot
of words unique to it which will be unfamiliar
to other speakers of Malay. The language
spoken by the Peranakan (Straits Chinese,
a hybrid of Chinese settlers from the Ming
Dynasty and local Malays) is a unique patois
of Malay and the Chinese dialect of Hokkien,
which is mostly spoken in the former Straits
Settlements of Penang and Malacca. The use
of this interesting language is dying out,
however, with the Peranakan now choosing
to speak either Hokkien or English.
|
