Hello readers ! Here I am again, trying my best to spend some time to share something beneficial to everyone.
Yesterday, everybody was excited with the beautiful and memorable date ever existed in history which was 12.12.12 !!! Ya....very beautiful number and hardly forgotten. Congrats to those of you who can keep the best memories in life by getting married , celebrating birthdays , having newborn babies and other important matters on this historical date ! Surely it is the best memories ever...
What I'm going to discuss here has no connection at all with numbers or dates but it is about the way Malaysians practise spoken English. Malaysians have their own brand of English which is quite distinct from that spoken by the native speakers in Britain. There is a tendency by local speakers to reduce the number of syllables in certain words. Thus Malaysian speakers have contracted "spectacles" to "specs", "darling" to "dar" and many others.
Other than that, Malaysians also keen to use the word "horn" as a verb. Whereas standard English uses "horn" only as a noun. Therefore, local speakers may use a sentence like this : " The man horned loudly" , but the standard use is " The man sounded his horn loudly ". In standard English, horn is a noun, not a verb. Same goes to the words 'trumpet' and 'drum'. These words can never be used as verbs in standard English ! However, local users usually use them as verbs. For example in this sentence : "She is always trumpeting the cleverness of her daughter"., " Michael drummed on the table with his fingers".
Below are other examples of local expressions and words which are not standard English :
Chop
Local use : Chop this form, please.
Standard English : Please stamp this form.
On/Off
Local use : Please off the lights when you leave the room.
Standard English : Please switch off the lights when you leave the room.
(In standard English, on and off are not verbs)
Cut
Local use : We cannot cut buses on this busy road.
Standard English : We cannot pass /overtake buses on this busy road.
Open
Local use : Open the lights. Open the screw.
Standard English : Switch on the lights. Loosen the screw.
Follow
Local use : I will follow you to the party.
Standard English : I will go with you to the party.
(In standard English, follow means "to go behind" )
That's all for now ...! Let's try our best to use standard English and reduce oddities in our spoken English.
LinkWithin
