Selective Language Maintenance in Multilingual Malaysia

Aiming to understand the phenomena of language maintenance and shift in Malaysia, this chapter focuses on efforts by Penang's Chinese community to maintain Penang Hokkien alongside other Chinese community languages. The Malaysian Government has explicitly allowed the teaching of Mandarin Chinese in Chinese-medium schools, which resulted in the reduced use of Penang Hokkien and other Chinese community languages among the Malaysian Chinese community. Such a situation has caused sociolinguistic realignment in many Malaysian Chinese families, including in Penang, and raised questions about the survival of these languages in Malaysian society. Based on interviews with participants from Penang's Chinese community, the findings reveal that although past studies have demonstrated a decline in the use of Chinese community languages, the participants expressed their willingness to regularly use them in their daily life in various domains. Despite the announced desuetude of these languages, participants consistently used them and indicated their determination to pass on to the next generation.

Manajemen Konflik Pemerintah Kota Bogor Antara Forum Muslim Bogor Dengan Masyarakat Tionghoa (Studi Kasus: Perayaan Cap Go Meh 2019)

This study describes the conflict management carried out by the Bogor City Government over the conflicts that occurred between the Forum Muslim Bogor and the Chinese Community. In this conflict, it was found that there was intolerance that occurred in the people of Bogor City ahead of the Cap Go Meh celebration in 2019. Where the case of intolerance was carried out by issuing a circular issued by the Forum Muslim Bogor through social media. The letter was circulated very widely which contained an appeal to the Bogor City Government not to facilitate the Cap Go Meh/Bogor Street Festival celebration and called for the Muslim community not to participate in the event because it was considered to damage the faith. In this study, the focus will be on conflict resolution efforts carried out by the Bogor City Government using the theory of Conflict Management and Critical System Heuristics. The research method used is descriptive qualitative research method. Therefore, this study will look at how the conflict resolution carried out by the Bogor City Government towards the conflict. Keywords: conflict resolution, bogor city government, cap go meh. Abstrak Penelitian ini menjelaskan mengenai manajemen konflik yang dilakukan oleh Pemerintah Kota Bogor atas konflik yang terjadi antara Forum Muslim Bogor dengan Masyarakat Tionghoa. Dalam konflik ini ditemukan adanya intoleransi yang terjadi dimasyarakat Kota Bogor menjelang perayaan Cap Go Meh tahun 2019. Dimana kasus intoleransi tersebut dilakukan dengan cara mengeluarkan surat edaran yang dilakukan oleh Forum Muslim Bogor melalui media sosial. Surat tersebut beredar sangat luas yang mana berisikan mengenai seruan kepada Pemerintah Kota Bogor agar tidak memfasilitasi Perayaan Cap Go Meh/Bogor Street Festival dan menyerukan agar masyarakat muslim tidak berpartisipasi dalam acara tersebut karena dinilai dapat merusak akidah. Dalam penelitian ini akan lebih fokus terhadap upaya resolusi konflik yang dilakukan oleh Pemeritah Kota Bogor dengan menggunakan teori Manajemen Konflik dan Critical System Heuristic. Adapun metode penelitian yang digunakan adalah metode penelitian deskriptif kualitatif. Penelitian ini akan melihat bagaimana resolusi konflik yang dilakukan Pemerintah Kota Bogor terhadap konflik tersebut. Kata Kunci: resolusi konflik, pemerintah kota bogor, cap go meh.

Speech Act Varieties of Chinese and Non-Chinese Community in Medan Traditional Markets

In this study focused on to describing the types and functions of the Tionghoa community utterances that tend to use Hokkien language and the non Tionghoa community that typically to use Indonesian language. The theory proposed by Austin and Leech was used to classify and analyze the speech act data delivered and collected through a non-participative observation and taking notes technique. The data were obtained from five traditional markets in Medan from July to September 2020. The data showed five kinds of speech acts from both the Tionghoa and non-Tionghoa communities. A directive speech act was the dominant speech act obtained because the directive speech act influenced the interlocutor. In this case, the customer dominated the seller to do what the customer demanded. The directive speech act also showed the chief ordering function found in the Tionghoa community, and the bargaining function was located in the nonTionghoa community. The ordering directive speech act prevalent in Tionghoa speakers related to the character of the majority of Tionghoa community members in Medan, which was straightforward. In this case, they gave orders or directly asked for what they needed or sought. Meanwhile, in the non-Tionghoa community, the utterances refer to buying and selling laws, dominated by bargaining utterances, both bargaining for goods or prices. In comparison, the declarative speech act is the minor speech act found to express resignation towards the COVID-19 condition.

An Acoustic Analysis of Cantonese Lexical Tones by Chinese Youths in Seremban, Malaysia

Cantonese is widely spoken among the Malaysian Chinese community. Cantonese speakers are not only native speakers, but also non-native speakers. One of the difficult parts of Cantonese learning is lexical tones. In view of this, this study provides an acoustic analysis of Cantonese lexical tones produced by Chinese youths in Seremban, Negeri Sembilan. This study investigates the acoustic characteristics of Cantonese lexical tones by analysing the length features and pitch features of monosyllabic words. Six female speakers participated in this study. Three of them are native Cantonese speakers, while the other three are non-native Cantonese speakers. Data analysis was conducted by using Praat. In terms of length features, T2 and T6 are the shortest smooth tones, and T7 is the shortest checked tone. In terms of pitch features, T3 and T4 had greater changes compared to the previous study. All lexical tones produced by non-native speakers, with the exception of T2, are level tones. Moreover, in both groups, the vowel duration and pitch value of T2 are relatively the same as T6, and there is a trend of combination.

Parents’ Self-Reported Versus Child Evaluation of Parents’ Mental Health Outcomes: Is There a Difference

Older Chinese-Americans are more likely to experience depressive symptoms compared to the general U.S. aging population. This paper aims to examine the level of congruence between parents’ self-reported mental health and children’s evaluation of their parents’ mental health. Dyad-level understanding is particularly relevant considering the family-based medical decision-making preference in the Chinese-community. Older parents’ depressive symptoms were measured by PHQ-9 with a cutoff of 5 indicating the presence of depressive symptoms. Adult children were asked whether their parents informed them of their depressive symptoms or if they suspected that their parents were depressed. Logistic regressions were conducted. Parents’ self-reported depressive symptoms were associated with both adult children’s awareness (OR:3.28 (2.00-5.39)) and suspicion (OR:3.10 (2.02-4.77)) of their parents’ depressive symptoms. Results remained consistent among mother-child and father-child dyads. Study findings underscore the importance of incorporating adult children’s’ perspective in mental health research in the Chinese community.