ENGAGING EMOTIONS: UNDERSTANDING ANGLOPHONE CHINESE SINGAPOREANS’ COMPLEX RELATIONSHIP WITH CHINESE AS A MOTHER TONGUE THROUGH AN AFFECTUAL LENS

Abstract

Singapore’s bilingual policy requires all Singaporean students to be educated in English as their first language and an ethnic mother tongue as their second. In the government’s eyes, proficiency in English would allow Singaporeans to be globally competitive and proficiency in the ethnic mother tongues would help the individual to be culturally anchored to their Asian roots. However, such a language policy is too rigid and overlooks the linguistic subjectivities that Singaporeans may hold. As a result, Singaporeans whose language practices do not fit the norms established by state policy find their relationship with certain languages that they are made to learn, strained and a source where conflicts and tensions arise. This study thus looks into the lived experiences of eight anglophone Chinese Singaporean undergraduates with Chinese, their assigned MTL, and takes into consideration their emotional experience with the language. Findings from the study reveal a diverse range of positive and negative emotions evoked from the various experiences where the participants encountered Chinese. This was influenced by a multitude of factors. More importantly, it reveals the manifestation of certain problematic ideologies that stem from the bilingual policy. Hence, I round up by highlighting certain issues of the bilingual policy and providing some suggestions on how it can be improved on, in order to establish a more open and accommodating language policy.