Much has been said about Malaysian English radio DJs, newscasters and even plain 'ol English-speaking Malaysians speaking with what seems to them to be "American” or “British” accents - with the formal being largely a favourite amongst the wannabes.
Being an ardent radio listener and a music lover, radio is by means my mode of entertainment at home and in the car. I could tolerate radio commercials that stretch beyond 5 minutes at times. I could tolerate dee-jays babbling away for minutes on end after each song is played. I could even tolerate people speaking badly structured English a.k.a broken English. But if there is one thing which I find intolerable and which annoys me to the core is hearing some pathetic dee-jays faking up some American accents. If you happen to notice, there's at least one perpetrator in every English radio station in the country who is guilty of such offence. Usually after they are done yakking, I would often ask myself "What the hell did they just say?" Mind you, these are pure breed Malaysians I am talking about, ie. born, bred, and educated in national schools! So how and where on earth were they taught to pronounce words the American way remains a case of the X-Files to me.
What's wrong with speaking English the Malaysian way? And with that I don't mean throwing in the infamous "lah's", "ah's", "mah's", "one's" and whatnots in a sentence but speaking grammatically correct English - Malaysian style. And what's with the tongue curling at the pronunciation of the letter "r"? Malaysian English is based on British English. Surely we don't hear the British emphasising the "r" when saying "world" or "star" or "reverse" ex cetera. Our society needs to understand that copying the way the Americans speak does not make one appear classier. It just makes one appear desperate - desperate to sound like an American but failing miserably.
Let's face it. Watching one too many American dramas and movies, mingling with a group of Americans and spending just a couple of years in an American university don't mean one needs to acquire the traits of an American if one is not. Whether one's accent is genuine or made-up is pretty conspicuous to the ears. Don't get me wrong. I love the Americans and all things Americana. In fact, I look up to the Americans. But even that, I wouldn't stoop so low as so talk and act like an American unless I were born and educated in the United States.
We Malaysians need not speak with an accent to proof that we are proficient in the English language. The way I see it, it's only those who can't speak proper English that will subject themselves to being copy-cats. After all, it's their only way of hiding their incompetency.
It's time these badly programmed puppets grow out of their childishness and start behaving like mature, sensible, no-nonsense adults!
