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A LOOK AT ARTHUR YAP'S WORKS
Friday, March 29, 2013 | 1:02 PM | 0 comments
Throughout his studies and his teaching career,
Arthur Yap pursued poetry writing as a passion and craft. His works
focused on the daily aspects of life in Singapore. In my opinion, his
writing style was iconic of Singapore, capturing the mundane routines
and concerns of the local heartlanders on paper. His prose was constructed in
an approachable and understandable manner with minimal use of ostentatious
vocabulary that might alienate the audience. All in all, his poems were about
the people and for the people of Singapore.
~~~
The
Correctfulness of Flavour
waiting for
the lime sherbert to arrive,
mother turned around to her vacuous child:
boy, you heard what i said earlier?
nowadays, they emphasise english.
mother turned around to her vacuous child:
boy, you heard what i said earlier?
nowadays, they emphasise english.
boy rolled his
squinty eyes to the ceiling.
waitress returned, flustered, and started
on her own emphases:
lime sherbert today don't have.
mango got. strawberry also don't have.
waitress returned, flustered, and started
on her own emphases:
lime sherbert today don't have.
mango got. strawberry also don't have.
mother, upset
and acutely strident:
today DOESN'T have.
today DOES NOT have.
today DOESN'T have.
today DOES NOT have.
Written in simple language, The Correctfulness of Flavour highlights
the concerns of speaking proper English at the time. With the establishment of the modern port in 1819, British English was introduced to Singapore. Also, the port attracted migrants from neighbouring countries like China and India, resulting in a melting-pot of a host of languages. Over generations, these languages have influenced the syntactic and phonological structure of traditional British English to create our local brand of the language, Singaporean English (also known as Singlish).
This colloquial manner of speech has been frowned upon by the government; with ex-Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong describing Singlish as "English corrupted by Singaporeans". According to them, mastery of Standard English was essential to communicate in the "global language of commerce, business and technology". This was to the extent that the government pushed forth with an annual campaign to improve the standards of English. Dubbed the 'Speak Good English Movement', it aimed to foster a sense of pride in using proper English and discourage the notion of having Singlish as part of our national identity.
The poem captures the citizens' take on the issue. The mother, who incorrectly 'corrects' a grammatical error, plays the role of a one who means well, but inadvertently commits another error in the process; provoking emotions of endearment. It would seem that even with the desire to master standard English, Singlish is something deeply rooted in our community and cannot be easily erased from our identity. Even the fabricated titular word "correctfulness' points to this. In essence, The Correctfulness of Flavour is a social commentary which gently pokes fun at the locals' struggle to code-switch with light-hearted irony.
This colloquial manner of speech has been frowned upon by the government; with ex-Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong describing Singlish as "English corrupted by Singaporeans". According to them, mastery of Standard English was essential to communicate in the "global language of commerce, business and technology". This was to the extent that the government pushed forth with an annual campaign to improve the standards of English. Dubbed the 'Speak Good English Movement', it aimed to foster a sense of pride in using proper English and discourage the notion of having Singlish as part of our national identity.
The poem captures the citizens' take on the issue. The mother, who incorrectly 'corrects' a grammatical error, plays the role of a one who means well, but inadvertently commits another error in the process; provoking emotions of endearment. It would seem that even with the desire to master standard English, Singlish is something deeply rooted in our community and cannot be easily erased from our identity. Even the fabricated titular word "correctfulness' points to this. In essence, The Correctfulness of Flavour is a social commentary which gently pokes fun at the locals' struggle to code-switch with light-hearted irony.
Labels: Arthur Yap, Justus