Singapore English
Singapore English is the set of varieties of the English language native to Singapore. In Singapore, English is spoken in two main forms: Singaporean Standard English, which is grammatically similar to British English, and Singaporean Colloquial English—better known as Singlish—the colloquial register of English spoken between Singaporeans. Many Singaporeans code-switch between the two forms where necessary.
Singapore is a cosmopolitan society. In 2020, nearly half of [Chinese Singaporean|Singaporeans of Standard Mandarin|Chinese descent] reported English as their main language at home, while only a third spoke Mandarin. The remaining spoke various varieties of Chinese such as Hokkien, Cantonese or Teochew. Most Singaporeans of Indian descent speak either English or a South Asian language. Many Malay Singaporeans use Malay as the lingua franca among the ethnic groups of the Malay world, while Eurasians and mixed-race Singaporeans are usually monolingual in English.
English is the medium of communication among students from preschool to university in Singapore. Many families use two or three languages on a regular basis, and English is often one of them. The level of fluency in English among residents in Singapore also varies greatly from person to person, depending on their educational background, but English in general is nevertheless understood, spoken and written as the main language throughout the country.
Classification of Singapore English
Singapore English can be classified into Singapore Standard English and Singapore Colloquial English. The language consists of three sociolects: Acrolect, Mesolect, and Basilect. Both Acrolect and Mesolect are regarded as Standard Singapore English, while Basilect is considered as Singlish.- Acrolect; there is no substantial difference from Standard British English, though there may be some features of pronunciation that indicate the speaker is Singaporean, such as use of a full vowel in unstressed syllables and a relatively monophthongal realisation of the vowel.
- Mesolect; it has some features distinct from SBE
- # Question tenses in an indirect form; e.g. "May I ask where is the toilet?"
- # Indefinite article deletion ; e.g. "May I apply for car licence?"
- # Lack of marking in verb forms ; e.g. "He always go to the shopping centre."
- Basilect ;
- # Generalised "is it" question tag; e.g. "You coming today, Is it?"
- # Consistent copula deletion; e.g. "My handwriting no good, lah."
- # Use of particles like ah; lah, e.g. "Wait ah; Hurry lah, I need to go now!"
Standard Singapore English
Standard Singapore English, also called Singapore Standard English, is the standard form of English used in Singapore. It generally resembles British English and is often used in more formal settings such as the workplace or when communicating with people of higher authority such as teachers, bosses and government officials. Singapore English acts as the "bridge" among different ethnic groups in Singapore. Standard Singapore English retains British spelling and grammar.History
The British established a trading post on the island of Singapore in 1819, and the population grew rapidly thereafter, attracting many immigrants from Chinese provinces and from India. The roots of Standard Singapore English derive from nearly a century and a half of British control. Its local character seems to have developed early in the English-medium schools of the 19th and early-20th centuries, where the teachers often came from India and Ceylon, as well as from various parts of Europe and from the United States of America. By 1900 Eurasians and other locals were employed as teachers. Apart from a period of Japanese occupation, Singapore remained a British colony until 1963, when it joined the Malaysian federation, but this proved a short-lived alliance, largely due to ethnic rivalries. Since its expulsion from the Federation in 1965, Singapore has operated as an independent city-state. English served as the administrative language of the British colonial government, and when Singapore gained self-government in 1959 and independence in 1965, the Singaporean government decided to keep English as the main language to maximise economic prosperity. The use of English as the nation's first language serves to bridge the gap between the diverse ethnic groups in Singapore; English operates as the lingua franca of the nation. The use of English as a global language for commerce, technology and science has also helped to expedite Singapore's development and integration into the global economy. Public schools use English as the main language of instruction, although students are also required to receive part of their instruction in their mother tongue; placement in such courses is based on ethnicity and not without controversy.The standard Singaporean accent used to be officially RP. However, in recent decades, a standard Singaporean accent, quite independent of any external standard, including RP, started to emerge. A 2003 study by the National Institute of Education in Singapore suggests that a standard Singaporean pronunciation is emerging and is on the cusp of being standardised. Singaporean accents can be said to be largely [Rhotic and Rhoticity in English|non-rhotic accents|non-rhotic].
In 2023, opposition leader Pritam Singh advocated for English proficiency testing for immigrants seeking Singaporean citizenship. Polling data of native-born Singaporeans show broad support for the proposal.
Singapore's Speak Good English Movement
The wide use of Singlish led the government to launch the Speak Good English Movement in Singapore in 2000 in an attempt to replace Singlish with Standard English. This movement was made to show the need for Singaporeans to speak Standard English. Nowadays, all children in schools are being taught Standard English with one of the other official languages being taught as a second language. In Singapore, English is a "working language" that serves the economy and development and is associated with the broader global community. Meanwhile, the rest are "mother tongues" that are associated with the country's culture. Speaking Standard English also helps Singaporeans communicate and express themselves in their everyday life.In 2014, the Singaporean government made an announcement entitled "Speak Good English Movement brings fun back to Grammar and good English", where the strategies that would be used to promote their program in the following years were explained. Specifically, the government would release a series of videos demystifying the difficulty and dullness of the grammatical rules of the English language. These videos provide a more humorous approach to learning basic grammar rules. Singaporeans will now be able to practise the grammatical rules in both written and spoken English thanks to a more interactive approach.
Malay, Indian, and Chinese influences
Although Standard Singapore English is mainly influenced by British English and, recently, American English, there are other languages that also contribute to its use on a regular basis. The majority of Singaporeans speak more than one language, with many speaking three to four. Most Singaporean children are brought up bilingual. They are introduced to Malay, Chinese, Tamil, or Singapore Colloquial English as their native languages, depending on their families' ethnic backgrounds and/or socioeconomic status. They also acquire those languages from interacting with friends in school and other places. Naturally, the presence of other languages in Singapore has influenced Singapore English, something particularly apparent in Singlish.Both Singapore English and Singapore colloquial English are used with multiple accents. Because Singaporeans speak different ethnic mother tongues, they exhibit ethnic-specific features in their speech such that their ethnicity can be readily identified from their speech alone. The strength of one's ethnic mother tongue-accented English accent depends on factors like formality and their language dominance. Words from Malay, Chinese, and Tamil are also borrowed, if not code-switched, into Singapore English. For example, the Malay words "makan", "habis", and the Hokkien word "kiasu" are constantly used, having been adopted into the lexicon, to the point that Singaporeans are not necessarily aware of which language those words are from. The nativisation process has progressed so far that the word "kiasu" has been used in the Singapore press since 2000 without being italicised, and went onto claim international recognition, being admitted to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2007.
Overview of Singaporean accents
Broadly speaking, Singaporean English accents are based on the sound systems of standard non-rhotic Southern British English accents, as is often the case with dialects of English spoken in Commonwealth nations aside from Canada. Like many of these dialects, the vowels in and are distinct in Singapore English, and the word plant is generally pronounced with the vowel, rather than the vowel.As English becomes more often used as a day-to-day language in Singapore, mass adoption of local norms have led to the formation of a standard, endonormative Singaporean accent with characteristics primarily driven by conventions and language change within the country. Nowadays, the accents of many Singaporeans reflect a compromise between local characteristics and standard language given that English has been institutionalised in the country for decades. Accents still vary, depending on age, upbringing and the race or heritage language of the speaker.
Rhoticity
Singapore English is predominantly non-rhotic, like Australian and Nigerian accents, so most speakers will leave out the r sound in words like far. Though rare, studies suggest that final r sounds are more likely to be realised by younger speakers and women among Chinese and Indian Singaporeans, and that this tendency is more common in content words than in function words, and in reading than in conversation.Rhoticity is generally uncommon, and if adopted, seldom consistent, even in environments where a linking r could occur, e.g., my brother is and my sister is. In a 2018 study, r sounds were dropped at the end of syllables more than 90% of the time in conversational speech, while linking r was used less than 20% of the time. Cases of intrusive r were negligible.
Semi-rhotic accents are quite commonly heard on radio, where some presenters have adopted more North American-like accents, though this is not representative of the ordinary local accent.
High vowels
The vowel is closer to the vowel in than in most other dialects, and at its most extreme, it can be as high and front as the latter vowel, making sit and seat potential homophones. Several studies confirm significant overlap between these two vowels, however and demonstrate that a distinction is still actively maintained by most people. Speakers may also rely on vowel length to distinguish words like rid and read; in this case the vowel is markedly shorter. Realising as a short, tense vowel is characteristic of Singlish pronunciation, or more colloquial-sounding accents.Like and, formant plots show significant overlap between the and vowels, raising the possibility of a – merger. Other studies report a robust distinction in vowel quality and duration. The vowel is itself relatively high and back in vowel space—more so than in most mainstream dialects of English. While previous research has categorised as a back vowel, more recent studies suggest that -fronting is now prevalent among younger speakers, and that it is more accurate to classify this variant of as a near-back or centralised vowel.
High-mid vowels
There is a tendency towards monophthongal pronunciations for and, both coming close to and in terms of quality for many speakers. In other cases, they are diphthongs with minimal change in quality. Studies indicate that in general, this vowel tends to be more diphthongal for Chinese Singaporeans than for Malays. Whether these vowels are short or long depends on the phonetic environment. Findings from lend weight to the proposition that and are, in general, somewhat diphthongal and not entirely monophthongs.Low vowels
– merger
The vowels in and are seldom distinguished in conversational speech, meaning kettle and cattle, better and batter, and wreck and rack have identical pronunciations. Any distinction is less likely between words ending in stop consonants, like met and mat, though bed and bad are kept distinct. Some studies report that tends to be less centralised in vowel space despite the overlap, and that Malays are more likely than Indian and Chinese speakers to merge and in everyday speech. reports a vowel shift suggesting that the normalisation of the – merger is underway.''Next''–''text'' split
For nearly all speakers, next and text do not rhyme, owing to a vowel split affecting the lexical set. The word next is realised with the raised vowel, which is distinguished from the low-mid vowel in text. The raised vowel occurs unsystematically in a small subset of words including leg, dead and head. Other words like fed and neck do not have this vowel. For many speakers, it is equivalent to the vowel in, in which case dead rhymes with made, but not with fed. Taking this into account, speakers with the complete – merger will distinguish lag from leg, but not the words lad and led. Besides next, leg, dead and head, the raised vowel also occurs in egg, bed and red, making red and read non-homophones.The next–''text split occurs in tandem with, and appears to be motivated by the – merger in the speech of younger Singaporeans, who are more likely than older speakers to raise the vowel in next, though younger speakers raise it to a lower height on average. While words with the raised vowel tend to end in voiced stop consonants like and, this split is not phonologically conditioned, unlike raising in Pacific Northwest English—given that leg and beg'' do not rhyme. Rather, the appearance of the vowel seems to be somewhat correlated with the commonness of the word in daily conversation.
Low back vowels
The vowel is a rounded, low back vowel. The vowel in / may be longer and closer to cardinal and this tendency is stronger before voiced consonants and in open syllables. Investigations by show that speakers produce an allophone of the vowel that is higher and further back in words not closed by final consonants, like more and saw. The vowel is otherwise the same as for many speakers, resulting in identical pronunciations for cot and caught, though new research suggests that older English speakers may still distinguish them.Low central vowels
For the vast majority of speakers, and have identical or near-identical vowel qualities, in the vicinity of open central. Sometimes a length distinction is maintained, with being longer in terms of duration. Like all free vowels, the or vowel is generally longer in open syllables, e.g. ramen or marker, than in closed ones, e.g. tart. The vowel, on the other hand, is always short. regards and as distinct vowels with contrasting vowel lengths.Due to its retention from older Received Pronunciation, the – split appears to be somewhat conservative in Singapore. Generally speaking, words from the lexical set, like ask, last and half, are realised with the vowel—the a in father—like most dialects of English from the south of England. Unlike some varieties of North American English, aunt and ant do not sound the same. Usage of the vowel extends to the words plastic and elastic. The vowel, on the other hand, has been reported to occur quite commonly in gasp, and rarely, in dance and can’t. In sample, command and demand, whether the or vowel is used varies from speaker to speaker.
Diphthongs
Assuming that, and are analysed as monophthongs, there are five remaining distinct diphthongs—namely, the closing diphthongs, and, and the centering diphthongs and. and have low central startpoints, and their trajectories end near the spaces of and respectively. and are alternatively realised as rising diphthongs beginning with glides.notes that, while words like, tour and sure are always realised with the diphthong or, many speakers will use the vowel after, like in, endure and security, though and are also commonly observed.
Words like fire are normally broken down into two syllables.
Vowel length
As in most varieties of English, free vowels are shorter when there is a following final consonant, so bee has a long vowel while beat has a relatively shorter one. The length of a vowel is determined by its environmental context, coda voiceless stop consonants are consistently associated with reduced vowel lengths, while coda fricatives like prompt longer vowel durations.– minimal pairs may also contrast durationally, with being a longer open-mid vowel in most contexts. Many studies have classified the vowel as a monophthong, in the neighbourhood of and.
Consonants
Pronunciation of ⟨''th''⟩
Th-stopping is common at the start of syllables, making tree and three homophones. This is generally more common in informal settings. Dental fricatives may undergo th-fronting at the end of words, so teeth sounds like teef. The word maths is an exception, given that is more commonly observed in this word. For some Tamil bilinguals, word-final th sounds are alternatively realised as stops.Stop consonants and voice onset time
Stop consonants in Singapore English are usually not released at the end of words, and voiceless stops can be aspirated or unaspirated in initial positions—how strongly a stop is aspirated can be determined by its place of articulation, the heritage or home language of the speaker and the level of formality of the conversation.In general, speakers with strong Malay or Tamil accents are less likely to aspirate initial stops, while Chinese Singaporeans are more predisposed to using aspiration. Measurements of voice onset time indicate that, in initial positions, is more likely to be aspirated, or exhibit stronger aspiration across all major Singaporean racial groups, whereas are characterised by weaker and even weaker aspiration respectively. Out of all the language groups surveyed in the study, Tamil speakers of Singapore English have the lowest average voice onset time measurements for the word-initial lenis stops.
Initial, unaspirated are found in loanwords from Hokkien and Malay, e.g. kopitiam. Additionally, aspirated also appear in Hokkien loanwords, alongside voiced stops.
Changes involving stop consonants
Final may show some degree of glottal reinforcement, final t and k are also prone to being completely replaced by a glottal stop in fast speech. The use of glottalisation is more common in Malay-accented English.Weakening t and d into alveolar taps in words like little and ladder is unconventional, though in recent years an increasing number of speakers—mainly English-dominant ones—have begun doing so, sometimes to convey a higher level of sociolinguistic prestige. T-flapping has been reported at higher incidences in compound numbers and across word boundaries.
Pronunciation of final "l"
There are three variants of final "l" in widespread use in Singapore English: dark, clear and vocalised "l"s. Vocalised "l"s are realised as high back vowels with varying degrees of rounding, e.g. mail. For speakers who vocalise their "l"s, the "l" sound can be dropped entirely after back vowels, diphthongs with back vowels, and sometimes mid central vowels, so that mole sounds like mow, and tool like too. Wall and war become homophones in the process. Moreover, the diphthong is monophthongised into before a vocalised "l", so Nile and now are similar-sounding.Chinese Singaporeans, especially older speakers, are more likely to vocalise final "l"s. Vocalised "l"s are regarded as an attribute of the speech of middle-aged, or middle-class Chinese Singaporeans. The use of clear "l"s at the end of words is observed in more pronounced Malay accents, though they also regularly occur in the speech of some Indian Singaporeans. Dark "l"s are not tied to any particular ethnic accent or identity, and they are more likely to be recognised as a "pan-Singaporean" feature.
Pronunciation of ''r''
The most common and predominant realisation of the r sound in Singapore English is the postalveolar approximant, roughly the same sound found in most native varieties of English worldwide. The alveolar tap or trill is an alternative realisation of r among Malay and Indian Singaporeans and older speakers in general. Among Tamil Singaporeans, the trilled variant appears to be extremely rare in comparison to the approximant and tapped r. A rare and emergent variant of r, indicative of R-labialisation and described as a labiodental approximant, has also been reported.Voicing and devoicing
Some degree of final-obstruent devoicing has been reported to occur in Singapore English. Devoicing seldom takes place between vowels, so is it? maintains the. Newer studies dispute the idea that devoicing leads to ambiguity, and argue that underlying voicing is still recoverable from factors like the length of the consonant involved and the duration of the preceding vowel.Conversely, there is an opposite tendency to voice coronal fricatives between vowels in some words like December → De'ember and pressure → pre'ure, and even across word boundaries, so this is becomes thi ''is'', though this tendency seems to be somewhat sporadic, with regard to which words are affected.
Final consonant cluster reduction
Certain final consonant clusters tend to be reduced in conversational speech, so list drops its final and ask loses the, however speakers are seldom consistent in doing so. To give other examples—the clusters, as in environment and end, are both reduced to, while the sequences, as in jump, act and lift, drop their rightmost consonants.The sequence, as in old, is also commonly reduced to. Since those who vocalise their "l"s tend to drop them completely after mid central and back vowels, old may be further reduced to, with both the l and d dropped, e.g., old show becomes . This does not apply to the past tense ending -ed.
Lexical incidence
While words generally follow the pronunciation patterns of Southern British English accents, so figure is pronounced, and the words new, due and tune do not exhibit yod-dropping, there are several exceptions—notably, want and what are both pronounced with the open central vowel, like most varieties of North American English, instead of the rounded vowel that is predominant in Southern England and Australia.- Many speakers will use the vowel for won, so that it rhymes with con and no longer sounds like one.Their is pronounced informally, making it distinct from there, which rhymes with mare.Flour is pronounced, and is clearly distinct from flower.Seems and seen are sometimes realised with the lax i vowel found in words like.
- Many speakers will use a mid central vowel for love, above and glove rather than the open vowel.Twelve is sometimes pronounced "chwelve".
Stress and intonation
Singapore English is characterised by a unique intonational system where pitch tends to be slightly raised at the end of a word with lexical stress. According to one analysis, the rightmost syllable of a stressed word or phonological word is marked with higher pitch, while words with no stress and unstressed initial syllables carry relatively lower pitch. Meanwhile, all other non-final stressed syllables coincide with a mid level tone, or a similar pitch contour between low and high levels. There is also a tendency for pitch contours to be accentuated near the start of a sentence and diminished towards the end, and for pitch to drop or level out at the end of declarative sentences. For example, in the phrase I don't remember [Tone letter|], pitch starts off low in I, then rises to a higher level in don't. The word remember is then realised with a less accentuated low–mid–high pitch contour.Tone assignment only takes place within the scope of the phonological word. Cranberry takes on a high–mid–high pitch contour [Tone letter|], since cran and berry are analysed as separate words. Similarly, in brainstorm [Tone letter|], brain and storm are both assigned high pitch. Prefixes with stress constitute their own phonological words, so the re in reenact [Tone letter|] is high-pitched. In words where the prefix is unstressed or less salient, like unfortunate [Tone letter|] and nonsense [Tone letter|], the prefix is not treated as a separate unit with stress and is therefore not assigned high pitch.
One alternative analysis, that offers a more generalised description of the intonational system, posits that high pitch is associated with the right edge of an accentual phrase, and low pitch with the left edge; an accentual phrase may consist of a content word with zero or any number of preceding unstressed function words. For instance, in a sentence like I joined the call, in which I joined is analysed as a single accentual phrase, joined can be realised with rising pitch starting from the low pitch in I, in lieu of consistently high pitch. In this model, phonological words and prefixes with stress are analysed as belonging to separate accentual phrases. Other intonational variants have also been noted. For instance, flat pitch contours can sometimes span the entire length of words and accentual phrases where rising contours would normally be expected.
Wider pitch range is associated with the introduction of a topic near the start of a sentence. Elsewhere in the sentence, differences in pitch are less prominent, so low, mid and high tones may collapse into roughly the same pitch level. The end of a sentence is marked by a subtle drop or leveling out in pitch. Yes–no questions are accompanied with rising pitch, as is the case in many other dialects of English. Rising pitch is also commonly used when there is non-final information at the end of an utterance, sometimes to indicate a non-final item in a list.
Timing
Unstressed initial syllables are often realised with shorter duration and lower intensity. There is also a tendency for the last syllable in an utterance to be lengthened or dragged out.Singapore English tends towards syllable timing, unlike British English, which is considered stress-timed.
Spelling and vocabulary
20th-century British English had had significant influence over the development of what is now called Singapore English, and there is still a tendency for some older Singaporeans to use expressions that would be considered old-fashioned in London today. In everyday speech, some words are more ubiquitous in Singapore English, like scold—in the UK, tell off is the more natural expression and scold may be regarded as somewhat formal or dated. Still, much of Singapore English vocabulary parallels that of the English spoken in Southern England and other Commonwealth nations—barring some exceptions. Standard Singapore English follows British spelling conventions.Some words unique to Singapore English are lexical innovations, often compound words, while some words have taken on completely different meanings—for instance, keep is often used with the meaning of “put away” or “put back”, rather than “hold on to something”.
Slang and colloquialisms
Some colloquial, English-derived phrases and expressions exclusive to Singaporean English include close one eye, meaning to “turn a blind eye to something”, and spoil the market, meaning “to raise the bar by overachieving”.Loanwords from local languages
Terms derived or borrowed from Hokkien and Malay are commonplace in informal contexts, and are used regularly in Singlish. Some of these loanwords refer to local concepts and are not italicised in print. Other loanwords are generally restricted to colloquial use.Foreign dialects of English in Singapore
A wide range of foreign English dialects can be heard in Singapore. American and British accents are often heard on local television and radio due to the frequent airing of foreign television programmes.Singapore Colloquial English / Singlish
Unlike Singapore Standard English, Singlish includes many discourse particles and loan words from Malay, Mandarin and Hokkien. Many of such loan words include swear words, particularly Hokkien profanities such as "kanina" and "chee bai". Hence, it is commonly regarded with low prestige in the country and not used in formal communication.However, Singlish has been used in several locally produced films, including Army Daze, Mee Pok Man and Talking Cock the Movie, among others. Some local sitcoms, in particular Phua Chu Kang Pte Ltd, also feature extensive use of Singlish.
The proliferation of Singlish has been controversial and the use of Singlish is not endorsed by the government. Singapore's first two prime ministers, Lee Kuan Yew and Goh Chok Tong, have publicly declared that Singlish is a substandard variety that handicaps Singaporeans, presents an obstacle to learning standard English, and renders the speaker incomprehensible to everyone except another Singlish speaker. The country's third, Lee Hsien Loong, has also said that Singlish should not be part of Singapore's identity. In addition, the government launched the Speak Good English Movement in 2000 to encourage Singaporeans to speak proper English.
Despite strong criticisms of Singlish, linguist David Yoong has put forward the argument that "Singaporeans who subscribe to Singlish and have a positive attitude towards the code see Singlish as a language that transcends social barriers" and that the language can be used to "forge rapport and, perhaps more importantly, the Singaporean identity". Sociolinguist Anthea Fraser Gupta also argues that Singlish and standard English can and do co-exist, saying that "there is no evidence that the presence of Singlish causes damage to standard English". This was followed by organisers of the Speak Good English Movement clarifying that they are "not anti-Singlish", with their primary intention instead to ensure that Singaporeans are able to speak standard English first. A spokesperson was quoted as saying: "The presence of Singlish causes damage to standard English only when people do not have a good grounding in standard English".
English language trends in Singapore
In 2010, speakers of English in Singapore were classified into five different groups:- Those who have no knowledge of English ;
- Those who regard English as a foreign language, have limited command of, and seldom speak the language ;
- Those who learnt English at school and can use it but have a dominant other language ;
- Those who learnt English at school and use it as their dominant language ;
- Those who learnt English as a native language and use it as their dominant language.
| Language | 1990 | 2000 | 2010 | 2015 | 2020 |
| English | 18.8 | 23.0 | 32.3 | 36.9 | 48.3 |
| Mandarin | 23.7 | 35.0 | 35.6 | 34.9 | 29.9 |
| Chinese varieties | ? | 23.8 | 14.3 | 12.2 | 8.7 |
| Malay | 14.3 | 14.1 | 12.2 | 10.7 | 9.2 |
| Tamil | 2.9 | 3.2 | 3.3 | 3.3 | 2.5 |
| Others | ? | 0.9 | 2.3 | 2.0 | 1.4 |
In 2010, 52% of Chinese children and 26% of Malay children aged between 5 and 14 speak English at home, as compared to 36% and 9.4% respectively in 2000.