Talk:Manglish

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Manglish vocabulary was nominated for deletion. The discussion was closed on 27 February 2012 with a consensus to merge. Its contents were merged into Manglish. The original page is now a redirect to this page. For the contribution history and old versions of the redirected article, please see its history; for its talk page, see here.

Although, I'm not going to edit it, I propose to substitute the suffix "one" with "wan" to imply that it is used as a sound and not as a proper English word. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.91.118.95 (talk • contribs) 04:51, 12 October 2005‎ (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I know this sounds a bit controversial. But I think it's a good idea, considering how similar the two really are.

You can see my original suggestion here: Talk:British and Malaysian English differences#Merge. All comments are welcome! — ran (talk) 04:56, Apr 28, 2005 (UTC)

Of course not!! Singaporeans (in general) aren't even familiar with Bahasa Melayu in Manglish! I can't believe you even said they were even 'similar'!! — Anonymous

They do have something in similar, but it is not enough to merge them up. So I'd say no to this. — Yurei-eggtart 14:41, 12 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Manglish indeed has more vocabulary (thanks to Malay Language), but the core characteristics of both the languages are indeed the same. You can safely say Singlish is Manglish without extended Malay Language vocabulary, with identical intonation, pronunciation and grammar. — Lance

No, Singlish is more deviated towards Hokkien influence compared to Manglish. Please don't merge them, let the virtual linguistical war between the Malaysians and Singaporeans continue on Wikipedia! Jason (talk) 17:01, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Manglish 2 cows joke is a broken link. The two cows jokebook seems to use subpages now rather than # tagging, but on the /M page there is no Manglish joke I could spot. So I removed it, but left the link inside a comment. ++Lar 14:44, 26 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Im a friend of the person who wrote Malaysian English article, now he's gone to Argentina and will return soon. Why the Malaysian English at the small section that lists all English from some countries is not directed to Malaysian English but Manglish instead????? Can someone responsible fix it?

Just wondering: how much of the stuff from Singlish can be imported here to Manglish? I suspect that the Grammar and Phonology parts are the same... but what about the Vocabulary? or the background info and usage? -- ran (talk) 05:35, 9 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

In my opinion, there are similarities in between Manglish and Singlish is because that:

• Malaysia and Singapore are located right beside each other. Assimilation of culture may happen.
• For Singlish, most of its special characteristics are derived from the Mandarin language. There are also Chinese in Malaysia, so it's not impossible to have similarities in between them.
• Both Singlish and Manglish are spoken widely because they are thought to be simpler and able to deliver the meaning better in a shorter way (Eg: British English - Are you sure? / Singlish/Manglish - Ya meh?). When a dialect is spoken so frequently, it can be widely spreaded.

Heh I don't know if I actually repeated the points...... correct me if I did. Apparently, I'm not a researcher of Manglish and Singlish, so I don't know if I helped. — Yurei-eggtart 14:56, 12 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Did someone copy this article [1] (Use the links provided at the bottom; you'll find them) from a website, or did the website added their article to Wikipedia? --Bruin rrss23 08:41, 22 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

the other site stole it. The webmaster has a habit or stealing WP's stuff and then copyright it as his/her own. Maybe it's time WP starts cracking on him. See Francis Light and then check http://west-malaysia.com/penang/francis-light.html. the similarity is anything but an accident. __earth ^(Talk) 17:38, 22 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Many Manglish Particles (at least for 1, 2, 7, 10, 11) seems similar to the ICQ english or colloquial English in Hong kong because of the Chinese intervention. --Hello World! 04:00, 26 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The entry "d/dy/ady/edy/ridy/oledi" can include "de" as well. 118.100.86.213 (talk) 14:30, 30 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

How about this?

Word	Meaning	Example
lah	Used to affirm a statement (similar to "of course"). Frequently used at the end of sentences and usually ends with a question mark (!).	Don't be an idiot lah!
mah	Used to affirm a sentence but not as strongly as "lah". Used at the end of sentences.	She's like that mah..
nah	Derived from the Malay expression of "Nah!". Used when giving something to another person.	Nah, take this!
meh	Used when asking questions, especially when a persion is skeptical of something.	Really meh?
liao	Means "already"	No more stock liao.
ah	Derived from the chinese expression "a". Used at the end of sentences, unlike meh the question is rhetorical. Also used when asking a genuine question. Besides that, some people use it when referring to a subject before making a (usually negative) comment.	Why is he like that ah? Is that true ah? My brother ah, always disturb me!
lor	Used when explaining something.	Like that lor!
leh	Used to soften an order, thus making it less harsh	Give me that leh.
one	Used as an emphasis at the end of a sentence.	Why is he so naughty one (ah)?
what	Unlike British/American English, the word 'what' is often used as an exclamation mark, not just to ask a question.	What! How could you do that?
got	Used as a literal translation from the Malay word 'ada'. The arrangement of words are often also literally translated. This particular particle is widely abused in Manglish, mainly because of the difficulty for the Manglish speaker of comprehending the various correct uses of the English verb 'to have'. Therefore, 'got' is substituted for every tense of the verb.	You got anything to do? (Kamu ada apa-apa untuk buat?) I got already/got/will got my car from the garage.

I know it's much more troublesome to maintain, but it does look better in the article. I posted it here because it's quite a major edit. Do you agree? --Bruin rrss23 14:02, 17 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I decided to add the table to the article. IMO, it would be an improvement to the article, but if you oppose, please reply on my talk page. TQ. --Bruin_rrss23 (talk) 10:20, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

man...this is so lame....

agreed...this is so lamest of ALL wiki articles out there....

i've never heard ppl in msia pronounce "dont know" as the above. as far as i know msians also say "donno".--kawaputra 11:08, 11 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have heard "don't know" pronounced as "dontch know". Usually, the speaker does it to acknowledge that he/she recognises that the "t" at the end of "don't" needs to be pronounced. BTW, I am from Malaysia, so I'm speaking from personal experience. Yewnique 14:33, 29 July 2007 (UTC)yewnique[reply]

Are u sure they're not trying to say "don't you know" ? Instead of "don't know"? kawaputra^tok2me 15:57, 29 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I'm sure. It's usually, "I dontch know (something)", so it really can't be "don'tcha know". It's probably not common, although I HAVE heard people say it. Where did you see this mentioned in the article? I've looked but couldn't find it. Yewnique 04:51, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I see. I removed it cos i thought it was ridiculous. U have to hit the "history" button to find it. Seriously, dont u think it sounds a bit cacat if u hear someone say eg: "i dontch know how to speak properly". Or maybe u talking about the proper pronounciation of "don't" where the 't' is emphasised? Like how a native english speaker (british) would pronounce it. If thats the case, its not Manglish right? kawaputra^tok2me 05:34, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

haha.. you have to understand that in malaysia many speakers of a different mother tongue may sometimes have great difficulty speaking english. Pronunciation is always in error and results in being repeated and made fun of sometimes. This is an example of that. I hope no one takes all these words overboard and try to include them as new vocabulary. It is more of a bad accent and pronunciation instead. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Info3000 (talk • contribs) 05:12, 16 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Kindly read WP:Original research. __earth ^(Talk) 05:49, 30 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

there is a remark i see under the table: "In other words, Manglish is a form of bad English - not something that one would proudly list under "language skills" in one's CV"

Is it truly a form of bad English? it should only be considered bad english if a person is attempting or intending to speak english, but does so poorly. However, in this case, we have relatively standard expressions that are commonly used by speakers, as shown in the table. Shouldn't it be considered a dialect instead, albeit one with a bad reputation? in Malaysia, it is so widespread that perfect English speakers speak Manglish among fellow Malaysians. Why should it not be considered a Malaysian dialect of English, much like in other English speaking countries? Does the English spoken in Australia and America, littered with loanwords and slang, carry the same negative connotation as Manglish?

And yes, I agree, don't know in Manglish is usually "dono", never "dontch know"

Gliding 20:45, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It seems that the article is more biased towards Manglish spoken by Malaysian Chinese. This article could be improved with a more balanced representation of all forms of Manglish as spoken by Malaysian from all races. Being a Malay and mixing quite a lot with all races, except for one or two, most of the expressions mentioned in this article I have never heard spoken or written in my life. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.184.122.4 (talk) 08:19, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Students in Malaysian schools are taught only basic and simpler conversational English using British grammar and spelling. Unfortunately, due to the multi-language environment the local teachers are not high up on pronunciations and intonations.

There is no such term as Malaysian English in any official context except for the ever-changing school curriculum modules in attempts to improve the command of English but without going into advanced lessons. Call it English 112, English for Primary Students, Malaysian English, Conversational English etc but "Malaysian English" is not an official dialect of English. On the streets, Manglish is just "Malaysian English" shortened as Singlish is Singaporean English shortened i.e. bad English that it originally was.

"Manglish" was coined after "Singlish" was coined in Singapore's attempt to stop such language being accepted on public media. For some reason however, it has turned out to be a quirky and amusing language to foreigners and some write about it to help foreigners adapt instead. And Malaysia wanted its own identity to the language instead of a term that refers to sibling rival Singapore.

What is common between the two is the way local language terms, intonations, exclamations and grammar are fused with English. Manglish however is fused more with Malay nouns and verbs as all Malaysians learned Malay in school whereas Singlish is more fused with Chinese terms as most Singaporeans do not learn Malay in school and the island republic has an overwhelming majority of chinese speakers.

It is however, possible to speak Manglish/Singlish without substituting English words with that from another language. By just changing the pronunciation, intonation, over-simplifying the grammar, redefining the use of certain english words, give meaning to phrases and using simple exlamations common to the region as well as paying attention to the expression and tones will have anyone speaking Manglish/Singlish.

• Wat la yu? (What lah you?) spoken in a rising disappointing tone means How could you? or How stupid can you get?
• Wat la yu.. (What lah you) spoken in lowering sheepish softening comforting tone means You shouldn't have or You should have been more careful but I still like you
• Got or not? spoken is rising tone means Did that happen? or Do you have it?
• Wear got? (Where got) spoken in rising exclamation means No such thing or I don't believe you
• Sure ah? spoken in rising question tone means Are you sure?
• O.K. wat? (OK what?) spoken in rising questioning OK and lowering assuring tone means Isn't this good enough? (with intent to assure that it is good enough) or This should be acceptable, isn't it?
• Like dat cannot la! (Like that cannot lah!) spoken with serious expression means I cannot accept it this way or in this condition
• How can? spoken in rising exclamation means How could this happen or How can this happen
• Die lah! spoken in somber or exclamation means I'm in deep shit or I would be in deep shit, both figuratively speaking
• ..is it? end any sentence with this question ignoring the grammar will mean Is this/that correct? or Is the statement true?
• When ah? Who ah? How ah? Why ah? Where ah? in rising ahs mean When? Who? How? Why? Where? respectively
• Eh hello! (hey hello!) or just hello! spoken in the middle of a conversation means That does not sound right or you don't seem alright. You are not paying attention, please stay alert!

Of course there needs to be some inclusion of common simple words in Malay or Chinese like Alamak! or Aiyo! (both mean Oh no!!) but by no means would the list of non-English verbs and nouns take pages. Many writers who teach Manglish and Singlish do so with reference to earlier light-hearted books that would have needed to be at least 20 to 50 pages long. Anything less might not sell. In truth, they have less to do with imported words but more with style.

Some online dictionaries might also define the term Manglish differently in their efforts to quickly be a contemporary worldwide dictionary that includes new slangs and localised words. They aim to inform and explain, not to standardize and regulate. In turn, others learn this definition from them.

PS. I will also include the above as a section article since there is quite some revamping to do anyway.

Info3000 (talk) 20:26, 14 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"Manglish or Malonish (or sometimes Malglish or Mangled English)..." Since when did it called as Malonish? Is this an insult from the Indonesian people? If no objections, I'll remove it from the article. --Kurniasan (talk) 22:38, 24 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

who put that thing up? its not even logical and notable. it is better to remove it.175.138.196.14 (talk) 18:34, 29 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Mr Granger, Why am I not able to add the list of words? Why are you deleting it? What copyright violation are you talking about? I have removed references to Urban dictionary and blog. Why is this list alone being deleted. There are other lists which don't have references? - panac1947 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Panac1947 (talk • contribs) 23:58, 28 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

As I said on my talk page, the information appears to be copied directly from Urban Dictionary and a blog—copying this much text word-for-word is a copyright violation. In addition, the text is not clearly labeled as a quotation from an external source, which is plagiarism. To top it off, there are other good reasons not to include the information: in particular, it doesn't have a reliable source. For these reasons, I've removed it from the article. —Granger (talk · contribs) 03:42, 29 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I have created and put the Manglish babel list onto Wikipedia, [[2]] . Put it as your userbox if you like. Regards, Palaxzorodice (talk) 03:00, 22 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This article has been waiting for proper references for over 5 years. It has been tagged as possibly WP:OR for over 2 years. It seems it is becoming less of an encyclopeadic article and more of a guide to Manglish. According to What Wikipedia is not "Descriptive articles about languages, dialects, or types of slang... are desirable. Prescriptive guides for prospective speakers of such languages are not". IMO lists off particles, nouns, adjectives, verbs etc. seem to be particularly inappropriate. Wikipedia is definitely not a language dictionary. Without authoritative sources, the inappropriate content may be deleted. Sionk (talk) 12:56, 10 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's an accumulation of unsourced assertions. Since it has had 2 years to improve with no effect, why don't we simply cut the lists? Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:23, 18 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I want to add some examples for this in the Other's section. Someone is not allowing me to do it. I can give reference to it from the Urban dictionary site. Why am I not allowed to add the examples? - panac1947 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Panac1947 (talk • contribs) 17:12, 10 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Cannot accept Arjunjmenon1's comment. I want to stress the bad English followed by Malayalees. Please "Don't cover the hole with darkness"!!!! I want Malayalees to correct their bad English. I have provided good references. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Panac1947 (talk • contribs) 05:34, 19 March 2014 (UTC) y[reply]

Why cant John accept Urban Dictionary?? I have also provided another reference from another site Just JO - — Preceding unsigned comment added by Panac1947 (talk • contribs) 05:34, 19 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A guy with id 'Meters' is trying to vandalise and troll my edits on Manglish. Though I tried to give a referenced article about a movie made on the subject from Wikepedia itself, this person is adamant on deleting them without my knowledge and finding false reasons for it. If he wants to delete the additions, he should first delete the article about the film. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Panac1947 (talk • contribs) 00:32, September 22, 2014 with additions by same editor at 04:30, September 22, 2014

My undo of your edit was not vandalism or trolling. As I said on your talk page [here], the edit to Manglish violates WP:NPOV since it makes an unsourced comment about it being the English spoken by poorly educated Malayalees. The sources are not WP:RS since one is to urban dictionary, WP:USERGENERATED since content can be written by anyone, one is to Wikipedia, which is never considered a reliable source, and the third is to a blog, a WP:SELFPUBLISHed source. None of those are reliable, published sources and thus they are not acceptable references. Meters (talk) 00:14, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

My reason stands "If he wants to delete the additions, he should first delete the article about the film." Also as the article states multiple times, there are many unreferenced sections? Don't you have any problem with them? My additions are at least referenced thrice. So there is some other motive! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Panac1947 (talk • contribs) 18:49, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It has been more than a week since I touched the article. The edit in question has been in the article since then, and is still not properly referenced. You have had lots of time to provide proper references. Since you have not, I will remove it again. It has nothing do with what else is or is not in the article elsewhere, and what other articles do or do not exist. Meters (talk) 20:25, 25 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks fort adding the new ref ("Malayali - English Pronunciation: With Special Reference to the Impact of Spelling" The Criterion: An International Journal in English, December 2011}.It confirms that Manglish is spoken by some Indians in Kerala. It does not say that Manglish is a result of their poor English education. In fact, the study used university students, and simply states that Manglish uses " ‘spelling-pronunciation’, giving equal stress to all sounds, parts of words, words and even sentences." which is a result of modelling English pronunciation on the syllable timed stress system of the Malayalam language. I will remove the "who have not had good English education" and the two references which are not WP:RS (the Wikipedia link, and the WP:USERGENERATED urban dictionary). Meters (talk) 19:49, 27 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Manglish as Malayalee's English is not being spoken by all Malayalees. Convent educated and Keralites who have grown up abroad say good English. But I can say 80% of the Keralites do speak Manglish. The author in the reference studied a target group of students and not all the people in Kerala. - panac1947. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:8:9880:38D:1991:D34D:8133:7C3C (talk) 04:38, 4 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The reference does not support the claim that it is the poorly educated who speak Manglish. It said nothing at all about education level, and the fact that it studied university students who spoke Manglish clearly chows that Manglish is not, or at least not solely, a result of poor education. Meters (talk) 04:55, 4 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I've removed your latest addition of this claim. Moving it after the ref just means that it is not sourced at all. Meters (talk) 05:07, 4 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

While parts of this article are interesting, it is not currently worthy of Wikipedia for the following reasons:

• it conflates two completely different subjects: Malaysian English and Malayalam English;
• it contains original research, speculation and opinion, presented in an informal style;
• most of the references are to unreliable sources like Urban Dictionary; and
• there is no coherent structure.

miracleworker5263 (talk) 14:27, 10 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. It needs some serious work to bring it up to standards. It seems (from the previous threads) that this article ahs had serious problems for a long time. Meters (talk) 16:56, 10 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

We're told that "lah" cannot be used in a yes/no question and must be replaced by another particle. But the example given ("Where are you ar?") ISN'T a yes/no question! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.230.240.75 (talk) 10:42, 25 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Sakai (Malaysian word). Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 12:37, 2 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The link for "Hokkien" in the lead links to the article "Min Nan". (I just added the same link for the word "Hokkien" just above, keeping with the "first link only policy"). But I noticed the link was to the article "Min Nan", not the main "Hokkien" article. I know nothing about the languages themselves. Which would be more correct (or either neither really "more correct" for a description of a creole/pidgin)? Jimw338 (talk) 00:51, 1 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The link for "Hokkien" in the lead links to the article "Min Nan". (I just added the same link for the word "Hokkien" just above, keeping with the "first link only policy"). But I noticed the link was to the article "Min Nan", not the main "Hokkien" article. I know nothing about the languages themselves. Which would be more correct (or either neither really "more correct" for a description of a creole/pidgin)? Jimw338 (talk) 00:52, 1 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]