i thot of this before.. but there's no practical use of
dialects, if u were to ask me..
u know, good, u duno, u dun lose out..
cultural roots? whats the point? it cant save me money, it cant
earn me money.. i do speak hokkien, and the only use of it is, as
what is mentioned here, to communicate with my grandparents..
give another 10 years and there wun be an issue anymore..
well, i think its precisely purpledragon84's reasoning that made
the gov decide that neglecting (abandoning) dialect is for a
better purpose for S'pore's future. Intially i felt the same way, i
mean it is practical reasoning. But what about intengible
considerations?
Read this quote from HowLanguages Work by Linguist David
Crystal:
Saving languages is exp, time-consuming nd energetic work; but
it is immediately worth while. It is difficult to convey the sense
of j and pride that ppl feel n they realize that their lang will
live on. Conversely, it is difficult toxpress the sense of loss
when you have not
experience it. ... Language death is like no other form of
disappearance. When ppl die, they leaves signs of their presence in
the world, in the form of their dwelling places, burial mounds, and
artefacts - in a word, their arhceaology. BUT spoken
language leaves no archaeology. When languages dies, which has
never been recorded, it is as i it has never been.
We dont have to learn dialect like a 3rd language but i feel the
need to know the basics (i.e. at least able to speak it like our
first generations in Singapore do) and also to understand and know
our dialect culture is essential to preserve the dying dialect
language in Singapore.
What do you think?
