Oo nit, Oo niversity, Swine flu and translation of English into Bahasa Malaysia, my comments written in bad English

My letter is published by Malaysian Insider as a comment here_

Adequate frontliners to cope with H1N1 – Liow

Dear YAB Tun Dr M, please use your power to stop the Malaysia Education System from engaging the reverse gear in teaching English

YAB Tun, you had wisely said that although there will be translations and translators; we could not wait all the time for someone to translate all the things for us. Especially in emergencies, where time is the matter of life and death.

Tun Dr M would be shocked to know some real cases of late translations even in critical areas as teaching of Medical Courses. (After all that is happening the best Medical University in Malaysia, UM.)

All the doctors and Medical Students around the world know that in almost all the branches of Medicine, new discoveries are made frequently. So, many Medical text books are frequently revised or edited every 2-3 years. Even in a poor country like Myanmar, lecturers and Medical students tried to get the latest textbooks by any means, i.e. even by illegal photocopying if they could not get the enough supply of original books.  This is especially true in Physiology and biochemistry. Even if a student insists to read and learn a one edition old text book he could be outdated and could fail the examination.

The Malay translated Physiology book using in UM was published about 15 years ago. This subject was taught in Malay and Anatomy was taught in English but at the exams the questions were set in Malay. So even for a Malay student who learned in English the “Carpel Tunnel”, a very common term which is understood even by many ordinary urban Malaysians, was translated in the exam question papers of UM, something like, “Terowong Karpal”. Even a pure Malay student needs to take some time to decipher all these terms.

And the translations of Scientific or foreign words is quite curious. If it is an obvious words like pronouncing Oo niversity, Oo nit no problem for us because we are used to. But I always wonder why the education authorities in Dewan Bahasa refused to just accept the foreign sounds or foreign  pronunciations  and try to write them differently in Bahasa to get that foreign sound like, Yu niversity or Yu nit etc.

Thank you Malaysia to name and retain Jalan U Thant. Curiously, that U in Burmese should pronounce like Malay pronunciation, Oo. But many Malaysians wrongly pronounced as Jl ‘Yu’ Thant. They also called our country’s name, Burma wrongly as Boorma. Although I know the ruling party’s name UMNO is in English, my friends shown their anger if I try to tease them that if they want to continue calling us Boorma, I wish to call their party like the way they call us.  

Please do not angry and retaliate by pointing out my bad English. Yes I accept that my English is very bad but the point here is I am not looking down on your language but try to portray some facts so that the experts could consider ways to fix it. If not all your children’s English would deteriorate to my English proficiency level or lower.

Just look at your astronaut, he needs to learn Russian language to go with the Russian team. He could not just bring a translator or dictionaries etc.

If you are already fed up or irritated with my bad English, just look at your Information Communication and Culture Minister Datuk Seri Rais Yatim, Arts (I mean that the degree he got was not a Science subject) PhD wrongly try to made a precedence by renaming the Influenza A(H1N1) , as stipulated by the World Health Organisation, into the outdated terminology, swine flu (selsema babi). He said that this was a better and more accurate way of reporting the pandemic to the public.

KUALA LUMPUR, June 25 (Bernama) — Information Communication and Culture Minister Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim today suggested that all media return to using the terminology “swine flu” instead of Influenza A(H1N1).

He said this was to ensure that the people realised the danger of the disease and to get the message across to them more accurately.

It is also easier for (radio and television) announcers to state “selsema babi” (swine flu) than H1N1 in Bahasa Melayu, he told reporters after an official visit to Pos Malaysia, here.

– BERNAMA, selsema babi (swine flu) than H1N1 in Bahasa Malaysia

I hereby end with YAB Tun Dr M’s remarks on teaching English.

1. We are all held to ransom by extremists. We want to be rational and we all want to do what is best for ourselves and our country. We all want the best for our children and their future. But we cannot do all these because if we do we will be accused of being traitors, not supporting our own community or our own religion. We will be demonized etc.etc.

2. So willy-nilly we become the instruments of these extremists and their narrow jingoism, to our own detriment.

5. Today we are grappling with the problem of education. We have three streams and woe betide anyone who suggests that we should not have them. We talk of liberal society, of free speech, but if you express some commonsensical views you would be labelled racist.

6. Then there is the controversy over the teaching of science and mathematics in English. We curse the person who had proposed this, calling him a betrayer of his mother tongue, of the national language. Then there are those who want to carry out a nationwide strike if the policy is not changed.

7. I am ready to surrender to the extremists, to pay the ransom demanded. What does it matter if the country goes up in flames, if the extremists win the day? What does it matter if the life of our children and their children is blighted? Anything for a quiet life. I want to be a member of the silent majority and just acquiesce. However the habit of a lifetime just refuse to go.

 THE EXTREMISTS by Tun Dr M