Malay-Indonesian Language

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The national languages of Malaysia and Indonesia—Bahasa Malaysia and Bahasa Indonesia, respectively—are the Malay language as spoken in those countries; Malay is also spoken in Singapore and parts of the Philippines. In both Malaysia and Indonesia, knowledge of the language is necessary for gaining citizenship.

According to historical records, the rulers of the Srivijaya empire in Malaya used and popularized the Malay language in the seventh century, and it has remained the most important language of the archipelago ever since. Bahasa Malaysia and Bahasa Indonesia share common words, idioms, and roots, and both belong to the Western Malayo-Polynesian branch of Austronesian or Malayo-Polynesian, one of the world's largest language families. The Malay language is phonetic in character, with few prefixes and suffixes for verbs and nouns. It does not have gender, person, number, or tense, and verbs are not conditioned on the basis of conjugation, declension, or tense. Bahasa Malaysia and Bahasa Indonesia have been written with a common reformed spelling system since 1972.

Malay as spoken in Malaysia—Bahasa Malaysia—is the national language and an important element in promoting nationalism and intracommunal harmony. Knowledge of the Malay language is essential for becoming a Malaysian citizen, and it is now the sole official language of the country. According to a census taken in 2000, in the total population of 22.3 million, Malays made up 66.1 percent, Chinese 25.3 percent, and Indians 7.4 percent. The Malaysian territories are more homogeneous than Indonesia, and Malay is used throughout the country. Although a significant number of Chinese and Indians speak other languages such as Hakka, Mandarin Chinese, and Tamil, they have increasingly learned Bahasa Malaysia. The government of Malaysia has promoted English as a second language, and it is widely used in business and academic circles.

Britain, which ruled over the country as a colonial power, was more benevolent toward the Malays than were the Dutch toward Indonesians. The first Malay printing press was established in Malaya in 1848, and it published several works in Malay: autobiographies, studies of folk traditions, poetry, court chronicles, epics, the Quʾran, other Islamic texts, and legal digests.

There was a resurgence of Malay nationalism during the Japanese occupation (1941–1945), when various publications in the Malay language awakened Malayans to their subjugation and repression. Although some Malay authors of the era at first supported the Japanese occupation, they changed their emphasis after the end of the war and in 1948 founded an association, The Generation of 50, to promote the Malay language. The publication of essays, short stories, and novels analyzing issues of social concern were given prime importance at this time.

When the Federated Malay States became independent in 1957 and subsequently when the Federation of Malaysia emerged in 1963, the government declared Bahasa Malaysia the sole official language. This language is understood and spoken in all parts of the country, and no party or political group of significance questions its status in the national polity.

In addition to Malay, more than 250 other languages or dialects are spoken in Indonesia; these include Acehnese, Batak, Sundanese, Javanese, Sasak, Tetum of Timor, Dayak, Minahasa, Toraja, Buginese, Halmahera, Ambonese, and Ceramese, all of which were influenced by Malay. Their vocabularies and idioms, like those of Bahasa Indonesia, have indigenized a number of words from Sanskrit, Arabic, Persian, Portuguese, Dutch, and English. The speakers of all these languages use Bahasa Indonesia as their lingua franca.

Bahasa Indonesia was systematized and organized in the twentieth century. At a youth congress held in Jakarta, Indonesia, in 1928, delegates pledged to promote Malay and to nurture it as their national language. Several political parties supported this resolution, and thereafter this language became the common medium for spreading revolutionary struggle.

The Japanese occupation actually fostered the acceptance of the Indonesian language. The conquerors banned the use of the Dutch language and ordered the arrest of anyone speaking Dutch. The textbooks for primary and secondary education, which had previously been written exclusively in Dutch, were translated into Bahasa Indonesia. The Japanese thought that the use of the Indonesian language in schools and official proceedings would promote anti-Dutch sentiments and would aid in the eventual acceptance of the Japanese language. But the policy of replacing the Dutch language with Japanese was never carried out.

With Japanese support, scholars of the era established the Komisi Bahasa Indonesia (Commission for Indonesian Languages), which systematized the Indonesian language and published a literary magazine highlighting linguistic, cultural, and political issues. The commission simplified the spelling of words borrowed from Sanskrit, Arabic, Dutch, and English, which were pronounced and spelled differently in different parts of Indonesia.

Article 36 of the 1945 constitution of Indonesia declared Bahasa Indonesia the language of the state, although in 1959 President Sukarno (1901–1970) explained that areas of Indonesia possessing languages of their own were entitled to use them as well. Both Presidents Sukarno and Suharto (b. 1921) nurtured the development of Bahasa Indonesia at the literary, academic, and official levels, not only as the language of Indonesians but as a bond to forge solidarity and kinship with the Malay world.

According to a 1990 census by the Central Bureau of Statistics, the use of Bahasa Indonesia falls into three categories: 15 percent use it for daily communication, 68 percent can speak it but do not use it every day, and 17 percent cannot understand it. The Indonesian government has set 2010 as the year in which all Indonesians will understand Bahasa Indonesia.

Alisjahbana, S. Takdir. (1976) Language Planning for Modernization: The Case of Indonesian and Malaysian. The Hague, Netherlands: Mouton de Gruyter.

Kaidir, Anwar. (1980) Indonesian: The Development and Use of a National Language. Yogyakarta, Indonesia: Gadjah Mada University Press.

Wong Hoy Kee, Francis. (1971) "The Development of a National Language in Indonesia and Malaysia." Comparative Education 7, 2: 73–80.

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