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Some things I learned when I was in Singapore and Indonesia about 10 years ago: - Our Singaporean host had business dealings in Indonesia and he said he could
by curtis 8y ago
Some things I learned when I was in Singapore and Indonesia about 10 years ago:
- Our Singaporean host had business dealings in Indonesia and he said he could get by just relying on his Malay language skills, so it seems that Malay and Bahasa Indonesia have a decent degree of mutual intelligibility.
- In one of the national museums we ran into an American professor who had been teaching part time in Indonesia for many years. Among other things, he mentioned that when Indonesia was founded, the government created a standard vocabulary for the language at the same time. He thought that that was one of the smartest things they'd done.
- One Indonesian woman that I spoke with (who I presume was Javanese) mentioned that one of the benefits of Bahasa Indonesia was that the Javanese in one village might not be mutually intelligible (in the practical sense, anyway) with the Javanese spoken in another village a few miles away. But you could always switch to Bahasa Indonesia to communicate.
- The word "Bahasa" means "language", and in Indonesian languages always seemed to be prefixed with ""Bahasa", e.g. "bahasa Indonesia", "bahasa Inggris", "bahasa Jerman". However, I recall several times hearing Indonesians using just the word "bahasa" when clearly referring to the Indonesian language. This was speaking in English though, so it might not be representative of how they'd say it in Indonesian.
- perlancar3 8y agoMalay and Indonesian language are like British and American English, except with far more difference in vocabulary and far more false cognates. Although not nearly as different as, say, Portuguese and Spanish. Yes, a typical Malaysian or Singaporean (especially if he has native or near native Malay language skill) will be able to order food at restaurants, buy stuffs, ask for directions, and even converse with an Indonesian speaker, albeit with awkwardness every so often. But for serious or technical discussion, the conversers might as well switch to English for better communication, even if they both only have moderate level of English.
- singingfish 8y agoYeah malay does my head in (I speak ok Behasa Baku, and I can usually make sense of dialecty Behasa Indonesia). However with malay it's like you can be having a totally intelligible conversation, except every 7th word you say is entirely wrong.
- lotsofpulp 8y agoBhasa means language in Hindi and it’s dialects also.
- satbyy 8y agoYes, the root is from Sanskrit (भाषा), got called over to SE Asia during the spread of Buddhism from India.
- vram22 8y ago>the Javanese in one village might not be mutually intelligible (in the practical sense, anyway) with the Javanese spoken in another village a few miles away. >The word "Bahasa" means "language", and in Indonesian languages always seemed to be prefixed with ""Bahasa", e.g. "bahasa Indonesia", "bahasa Inggris", "bahasa Jerman". It is probably derived from the Sanskrit word "bhaashaa" (writing it phonetically, if that is the correct term), since Indians had traveled to and culturally influenced parts of S.E. Asia in earlier centuries. Singapore (the name itself is from singha-pura which means lion city), Malaysia, Thailand, Cambodia, all have a lot of Indian cultural influence, not only in the sense of Buddhism, but words in the language, for people and place names, food ingredient influences and other things. It's quite interesting, really, for me, as an Indian, because as I read various topics about those regions, which I keep doing now and then, I keep coming across such words and other influences that I can recognize as having something to do with India. Of course, that sort of reading (about any country) is interesting even without such influences existing :)
- forapurpose 8y agoI don't know much about Sanskrit's history, but the linguistic similarities don't infer its influence on SE Asian languages. The influence could have gone the other way, from SE Asia to India (really, to South Asia; modern India's borders are a 20th century innovation, and Sanskrit seems to originate in Punjab, straddling modern India and Pakistan[0]) - and probably the influence would have gone both ways. Also, a third party could have influenced both, leaving them with similar vocabulary, and often influences are very indirect, such as Sanskrit's influence on European languages - it wasn't due to lots of Sanskrit speakers vacationing in France. [0] https://www.britannica.com/topic/Indo-Aryan-languages https://www.britannica.com/topic/Indo-Aryan-languages
- boundlessdreamz 8y agoThe Tamil kings of India had great influence on SE Asia during the Chola period.(1,2) Sanskrit was certainly used in SE Asia(3). Mostly ceremonial like Latin and used only by the ruling class I think 1.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chola_invasion_of_Srivijaya https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chola_invasion_of_Srivijaya 2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chola_dynasty https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chola_dynasty 3. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shailendra_dynasty https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shailendra_dynasty -