Sarawak Malay (
Standard Malay
Malaysian Malay ( ms, Bahasa Melayu Malaysia), also known as Standard Malay (Malay: ''Bahasa Melayu Standard''), ( English translation: Malaysian language), or simply Malay, is a standardized form of the Malay language used in Malaysia (as o ...
: ''Bahasa Melayu Sarawak'' or ''Bahasa Sarawak'',
Jawi: ''بهاس ملايو سراوق'', Sarawak Malay: ''Kelakar Sarawak'') is a
Malayic language
The Malayic languages are a branch of the Malayo-Polynesian subgroup of the Austronesian language family. The most prominent member is Malay, which is the national language of Brunei, Singapore and Malaysia; it further serves as basis for Ind ...
native to the State of Sarawak. It is a common language used by natives of
Sarawak
Sarawak (; ) is a States and federal territories of Malaysia, state of Malaysia. The largest among the 13 states, with an area almost equal to that of Peninsular Malaysia, Sarawak is located in northwest Borneo Island, and is bordered by the M ...
. This variant is related to
Bruneian Malay
The Brunei Malay language, or Kedayan (, Jawi alphabet, Jawi: ) is the most widely spoken language in Brunei and a lingua franca in some parts of East Malaysia, Sarawak and Sabah, such as Labuan, Limbang, Lawas, Sipitang and Papar.Clynes, A. (20 ...
, spoken in the districts of
Limbang
Limbang is a border town and the capital of Limbang District in the Limbang Division of northern Sarawak, East Malaysia, on the island of Borneo. This district area is 3,978.10 square kilometres, and population (year 2020 census) was 56,900. I ...
and
Lawas
Lawas ( ms, Pekan Lawas) is a small town and the capital of Lawas District, Limbang Division, Sarawak, Malaysia. This district area is 3,811.90 square kilometres, and population (year 2020 census) was 46,200. It is 1,200 km from the state ...
(Sarawak) and bears strong similarities with Sanggau, Sintang and Sekadau Malay spoken in the northern part of the
West Kalimantan
West Kalimantan ( id, Kalimantan Barat) is a province of Indonesia. It is one of five Indonesian provinces comprising Kalimantan, the Indonesian part of the island of Borneo. Its capital city is Pontianak, Indonesia, Pontianak. The province has ...
province in
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
. There is some debate on whether it is a vernacular variety of Malay or a separate language altogether. It is more similar to
Ibanic languages
The Ibanic languages are a branch of the Malayic languages indigenous to western Borneo. They are spoken by the Ibans and related groups in East Malaysia and the Indonesian province of West Kalimantan. Other Dayak languages, called Land Dayak, ...
compared to the Malay dialects of Sumatra and the Malayan Peninsula, and is different enough from
standard Malay
Malaysian Malay ( ms, Bahasa Melayu Malaysia), also known as Standard Malay (Malay: ''Bahasa Melayu Standard''), ( English translation: Malaysian language), or simply Malay, is a standardized form of the Malay language used in Malaysia (as o ...
that speakers outside of Sarawak are often unable to understand it without prior study..
Dialects
According to Asmah Haji Omar (1993), Sarawak Malay can be divided into three dialects which are:
* Kuching
* Saribas
* Sibu
Features
Sarawak Malay has features that are not found in Standard Malay, of which some of them are closer to
colloquial Indonesian:
* Sarawak Malay has only one
diphthong
A diphthong ( ; , ), also known as a gliding vowel, is a combination of two adjacent vowel sounds within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: that is, the tongue (and/or other parts of the speech o ...
which is unlike Standard Malay which has three which are .
* The diphthongs in Standard Malay correspond to monophthongs in Sarawak Malay so ''pandai'' and ''pulau'' in Standard Malay are and in Sarawak Malay.
* Verbs conjugated in the "agent focus" sense (e.g. ''biar'' > ''membiar'') conjugate differently in Sarawak Malay:
** In Sarawak Malay, the initial consonant in a syllable coda of the conjugated form of the word (e.g. the initial middle 'm' in ''memberi'') in Standard Malay is the initial consonant in Sarawak Malay ''mencari''
əɲ.t͡ʃa.riis ''nyari''
̩a.ɣibecause the 'n' in ''mencari'' is a
This is also found in how ''memberi''
əm.bə.riis ''meri''
ə.ɣiin Sarawak Malay because of the middle 'm' in ''memberi''.
* In the Kuching dialect and the Sibu dialect, open-ended final /a/ is an
just like in Standard Malay but in the Saribas dialect, it is instead an
so ''ada'' /ada/ is
.dain the Kuching and SIbu dialects and in Standard Malay but is pronounced as
.do
.do is the ''country code top-level domain
A country code top-level domain (ccTLD) is an Internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) t ...
in the Saribas dialect.
* In Sarawak Malay, /r/ is an uvular or velar fricative (
and
respectively), unlike in Standard Malay where it is an alveolar trill
Vocabulary
Sarawak Malay has a rich vocabulary of which many words, while also found in Standard Malay, have completely different meanings.
The numbers of Sarawak Malay differ a bit from their Standard Malay counterparts.
The pronouns too differ quite significantly,
with 1st and 2nd personal pronouns (both singular and plural) are both derived from 1st person plural pronouns (''kami'' and ''kita'' in Standard Malay).
Below is a non-exhaustive list of lexical differences between Standard Malay and Sarawak Malay.
Many of the words used in Sarawak Malay nowadays were borrowed from many languages such as English. Some English words that have been borrowed and have undergone significant pronunciation changes are as follows:
Word formation
The word formation rules of Sarawak Malay are very different from those of the standard
Malay language
Malay (; ms, Bahasa Melayu, links=no, Jawi alphabet, Jawi: , Rejang script, Rencong: ) is an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language that is an official language of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, and that is also spo ...
. Without prior exposure, most West Malaysians have trouble following Sarawakian conversations.
Sabahan is also different from Sarawak Malay, however they do share some lexicon, such as the word ''Bah'', which is used to stress a sentence. E.g.: Don't do like that - "Iboh polah kedak ya bah." It is similar in use to "lah" in
Singlish
Singlish (a portmanteau of ''Singapore'' and ''English'') is an English-based creole language spoken in Singapore. Singlish arose out of a situation of prolonged language contact between speakers of many different languages in Singapore, incl ...
and in West Malaysia. E.g.: Don't do like that 'lah'. Some words in Sarawakian Malay have a similar pronunciation of ''ai'' as ''ei'', as in some districts of
Perak
Perak () is a state of Malaysia on the west coast of the Malay Peninsula. Perak has land borders with the Malaysian states of Kedah to the north, Penang to the northwest, Kelantan and Pahang to the east, and Selangor to the south. Thailand's ...
: ''serai'' > ''serei'', ''kedai'' > ''kedei''. Some Sarawakian Malay verbs have a final
glottal stop
The glottal plosive or stop is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents thi ...
after a vowel or in place of final /r/: ''kena'' > ''kenak'', ''air'' > ''aik'', ''beri'' > ''berik.'' like in the
Aboriginal Malay languages
The Malayic languages are a branch of the Malayo-Polynesian subgroup of the Austronesian language family. The most prominent member is Malay, which is the national language of Brunei, Singapore and Malaysia; it further serves as basis for Ind ...
of West Malaysia.
Many words in Sarawak Malay diverge from the original pronunciation and some are totally different. E.g.:
Colloquial and contemporary usage
Contemporary usage of Bahasa Sarawak includes contemporary Malay words or incorporated from other languages, spoken by the urban speech community, which may not be familiar to the older generation. E.g.: SMS language. E.g.:
References
External links
*
Kaipuleohone Kaipuleohone is a digital ethnographic archive that houses audio and visual files, photographs, as well as hundreds of textual material such as notes, dictionaries, and transcriptions relating to small and endangered languages. The archive is stored ...
has an archived
notes on Sarawak Malay
{{Austronesian languages
Agglutinative languages
Sarawak
Languages of Malaysia
Malay dialects
Malayic languages