志异 Draft by Drama box July 2014 (english) | Page 29

remember how forcefully our
English teachers scolded us when
we spoke Singlish in class. Singlish
has come to signify status and class;
it doesn’t represent an identity,
rather, it represents the lack of one
– the inability to speak Standard
English. Singlish, the single thing
that for me represents our identity,
is seen as an aberration, a mistake
to be corrected.

to other international Anglophone
writers. Somehow, we have come
to equate excellence as being
similar, or even better, than the
‘original’ (our true motherland – the
English-speaking West).

The irony with us English-speaking
intellectuals is that we truly became
colonised only after the colonisers
left us. When we were still under
British rule, before the idea of a
The ability to speak Standard
Singaporean nation took root,
English, on the other hand, is seen
we were all separated by our
with pride, a sign of education and respective ethnicities, involved only
intelligence. I remember how proud in our communal struggles. Since
we would feel when we received
we achieved independence, our
the news that the Angus Ross Prize, solution to bridge the gap between
the award for the best GCE A-level
different ethnicities was not to
English Literature paper written
create a new hybrid identity, but
by a non-British person, had been
rather to discard all particularities
awarded to a Singaporean again.
to fully become an Other – to be
Standard English has come to be
Western. But the truth is that we can
synonymous with culture, something never be Western. This damning
far removed from the lower classes inferiority complex characterises
(who, because of their inability to
everything we do. It is the reason
speak in ‘grammatically correct’
why we intellectuals lament the lack
sentences, are rendered unable
of culture – it is not culture that we
to participate in the international
lack, but Western culture.
community). Is this the reason why
there is so little Singlish in local art? This, I suspect, is the true reason
In local literature, we all try to write why Jack Neo’s films are widely
in ‘grammatically correct’ Standard despised by the intellectual
English in order to be recognised
community. His films are seen as
as an intellectual who can hold up
crass, artless, and melodramatic;
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