What language does Singapore ACTUALLY speak?

I learnt so much from making this video, and I have a lot of knowledge now HAHA #teacherbao
Let me know in the comments below what you think and if I got any facts wrong!!
00:00 Introduction
01:05 The short answer
01:24 English + Mother Tongue
01:59 My sources of information
02:56 Why Singapore doesn't have just ONE language
03:38 Our 4 main races
04:10 What is Mother Tongue?
04:33 A little fun fact for my Singaporean friends
04:54 Why I can't guarantee everyone in Singapore speak English
05:15 History on our educational system
05:28 What does it mean to have a vernacular education system in the olden days
06:25 When parents start sending their children to English medium schools
07:03 Why our founding father pushed English as our first language
08:20 So then, who in Singapore can definitely speak English?
08:31 A personal story of my dad
09:11 Singlish and how it came about
10:26 Why the phenomenon of Singlish is actually common in many parts of the world
10:59 So if I'm visiting Singapore, does that mean I have to speak Singlish?
11:10 For our Chinese visitors, can our Chinese speak Chinese?
11:20 For our Malay or Indian visitors, can our Malays/Indians speak Malay/Indian languages?
11:33 Final thoughts and why you should visit us!
Credits to NLB website and articles:
www.nlb.gov.sg/main/article-d....
www.nlb.gov.sg/main/article-d....
eresources.nlb.gov.sg/newspap...
Credits to other websites:
www.moe.gov.sg/primary/curric...
www.guidemesingapore.com/busi....
www.sg/emergingstrongerconver...
www.timeout.com/singapore/res...
danielfooddiary.com/2019/08/0...
www.quora.com/Why-did-Lee-Kua...
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[@oranbrie]

loved this video! keep it up :)

[@baothebijin]

Thank you so much!! 🥹

[@hawk3431]

Love the video!

[@baothebijin]

Glad you enjoyed it! 😃😃

[@ggcasa]

Hello Bao, it seems that I am the 100th subscriber. Now I learned from you new things unknown to me. You are a pleasant person and I will continue to watch your videos.

[@baothebijin]

Thanks for subbing! 😃😃 i really appreciate it 😃

[@danggoobus]

insightful

[@baothebijin]

so glad you enjoyed it! 😃😃

[@matthewong1953]

Nice smile and easy way of telling her story. 😊

[@baothebijin]

thank you so much 😊😊

[@hengmunsong9695]

Nice video Bao (thumbs-up)! However it is more correct to refer to LKY as our Founding PM instead of Founding Father. No worries though. Cheers!

[@lktruong]

To each their own. The Americans refer to Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, etc. as "Founding Fathers". I don't see the difference between the establishment of the country Singapore as compared to USA's. Was there a country named Singapore before LKY took power as PM? Those men "founded" their countries hence they are referred as "Founding Fathers". I can agree LKY as both "Founding Father and Founding PM".

[@baothebijin]

Thanks for the info! 😊😊

[@seoulite.seungho]

I found the linguistic harmony in SG so mindblowing and beauuuuuuutiful✨In Korea and Japan ppl tend to be too finicky when it comes to english and be quite obsessed with grammar rules and whatnot. In SG on the other hand it seems the language is nothing but a means of communication to bond ppl from different cultures!

[@baothebijin]

ive never thought of it that way 😃😃😃 thank you for sharing 🥰

[@rosyxue1785]

For older generations like 50 to 69 years old, they can only choose to study one language either English or their mother tongue in specific school decided by their parents. They don't have the privilege to study both English and their mother tongue. For even more older generations about 70 years old, most are illiterate. Actually there are some older generations can spoke very excellent English so it really depends.

[@baothebijin]

thank you for sharing!! there are so many gaps in my knowledge and im happy to learn more 😃😃

[@hloc]

华人 (person of Chinese Ethnicity/Culture/Race/Descendant)
and
中国人 (person/citizen of China)
both simply translated to English as ‘Chinese’... aka, Chinese could be your Nationality… and/or your Ethnicity...

[@baothebijin]

thank you for sharing 😃😃

[@injanhoi1]

I heard Mandarin which is learned at high school is like a foreign language to Chinese Singaporeans. This is because most Chinese Singaporeans mother tongue is a dialect like Cantonese or Hokkien. So you speak in English to other races in Singapore? Unless you know their mother tongue which could be Malay or Tamil.

[@baothebijin]

yes so we speak English between different races and the mandarin we currently learn in school is the spoken mandarin across China also known as “pu tong hua” (directly translates to the common language) 😃😃

[@injanhoi1]

So in everyday life are more and more Singaporean Chinese speak in Mandarin to each other or do some speak in their dialect? I gather at home many are speaking in Hokkien or Cantonese for instance, the language of their ancestors.

[@baothebijin]

ok so it all depends on the parents!! i have friends whose parents speak to them in English, mandarin and also their dialects(to make sure they pass it down). in my own family, we speak both English(among siblings) and Mandarin(with parents)

[@dingus42]

yeah by right our "mother tongues" are one of the languages like Hokkien or Cantonese, but we learn Mandarin as a school subject (like how other countries might learn English as a foreign language) regardless of which group you are from. And for the younger gen we mostly talk to our friends in english or singlish, since they may be from different races and don't understand Mandarin either. But tbf almost everyone understands a lot of hokkien words due to their preservation in the Singlish lexicon.

[@thelias91]

Is it true that most of the chinese immigrants in sg spoke chinese language like hokkien, teochew, cantonese, hakka, hainanese… at the time, no one spoke mandarin. Then Lee Kuan Yew promote the Speak Mandarin Campaign. Now a lot of singaporean chinese refer mandarin as their mother tongue but that wasn’t the language of their ancestors, not their true heritage language, just a lingua franca. 🤔

[@baothebijin]

i didnt know that!! tbh i thought every chinese went to a chinese school and they somehow also learnt chinese in addition to their dialect. thank you so much for sharing!! im also learning as i go 😃😃

[@thelias91]

@@baothebijin It’s weird that some singaporean chinese don’t know that, but that’s what I understood from my research.🧐

[@dingus42]

yes that's true, none of our ancestors spoke Mandarin but it was an "artificially chosen lingua franca" per se due in large part to wanting to adapt to China becoming more powerful on the world stage. Unfortunate that the other chinese languages are slowly being lost generation by generation, but a lot of our culture is still very intimately tied to them e.g. Singlish vocabulary and even our own names (which are almost always written in a language other than mandarin)

[@thelias91]

@@dingus42 yeah overseas Chinese (like sinagporeans) keep their real name pronunciation, unlike Mainland population. Also singlish keep so many hokkien teochew canto and stuff words. Lah

[@pringlessourcream9527]

Yes, back in the day, our mother tongue is actually Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese etc.. Mandarine was a foreign language to most households. Only after Mr LKY wants to have a common language among Chinese. My understanding.