Research Interest

Spoken by the Straits-born Chinese of Malacca, Penang and Singapore, Baba Malay has been accorded different status according to various scholars. Baba Malay has been described as a creole based on Malay with a Minnan substrate (Lim 1981). However, Pakir (1986) views it as a dialect of Malay and in Grimes (1992), Baba Malay is described as a Malay dialect with some borrowings from Hokkien. Chia (1989) sees it as a “corrupt form of the Malay tongue.”

Of particular interest to this paper is the attempt to resolve these different views and to show that the Hokkien element found in Baba Malay represents a case of substrate influence rather than borrowing. The historical context of Baba Malay, coupled with the evidence given by an in-depth analysis of the grammatical structures, point to the direction that Baba Malay should be treated as a creole.

Methodology

The core structure of this paper will adhere to the following guidelines. We will consider the structural influence of Hokkien on Baba Malay in terms of substrate influence. Also, the chief focus will be on the syntactic features which will include the possessive and passive constructions. An examination of the loan words incorporated into Baba Malay will also be considered.

In the course of this paper, we will argue that based on both historical and structural grounds, Baba Malay should rightfully not be considered a dialect of Malay, but rather a creole with Malay as the lexifier and Hokkien as the substrate language.

Introduction: From History to Contemporary

The Babas who were considered the first descendents of Fujian Chinese and the local Malay women can be found in Malacca, Penang and Singapore (which were collectively known as the Straits Settlement of Malaya from 1826 to 1957). The most significant defining feature of a Baba is that he has mixed Chinese-Malay ancestry. These intermarriages took place for a number of reasons. As Chia (1980) points out, the Fujian Chinese immigrants were all adventurers who came to seek a fortune or make a living. As such, many did not or could not afford to bring their womenfolk along owing to poverty. Also, they did not have any intention of making Malaya their home at the initial stage. The most important reason was attributed to the fact that while the males were free to come and go as they wished, women immigrants were subjected to a strict watch placed over them by the Chinese authorities. It is out of this inter-racial background that the language of the Baba community developed. Such a historical context represents a likely context for creolization to take place, although it differs in some respects from the more familiar creolization contexts created by the slave trade.

While Malacca claims the status as the original birthplace of the Baba Malay language, Penang and Singapore were the places to which many of the Malacca Babas migrated to, especially during the turn of the nineteen-century.

The men of the Baba community are known as babas and the women nyonyas. We will use the term ‘babas’ in this paper to refer to the community as a whole. Interestingly, there are other forms by which the Babas have been known to be associated with. Common examples are ‘peranakan’, ‘Straits-Chinese’ and ‘Straits-born Chinese’. As Pakir remarks, “all these names developed over the time that the Babas were evolving as a distinct cultural identity in Malaya over the centuries.” Baba Malay too, has its fair share of other names such as the ‘peranakan community speech’, ‘language of the Straits-Chinese’ and ‘language of the Straits-born Chinese’.

The distinctive culture which supported the use of Baba Malay as a first language has been in decline since World War II and most fluent speakers are elderly, mostly in their seventies. The fate of Baba Malay in these three communities is very different. In Singapore, the Baba community completely switched to a totally different language which was English. As for Penang, the strong substrate influence of Hokkien, or Penang Hokkien to be more precise, has been noted. This is a reversal of the normal upward trend we would associate a post creole continuum with (where the acrolectal degree of sophistication is the ultimate goal). In Malacca, decreolization has taken place as Baba Malay speakers assimilate towards the lexifier language in the form of Standard Malay. This was largely because of changes in the educational policy of Malaysia where the medium of instruction in schools is Standard Malay.

Once a prestigious language used for trade cum other purposes and as an expression of their unique cultural background, Baba Malay has lost much of its lustre and has in fact gone through a period of steady decline. Scholars acknowledge that Baba Malay is a dying language.

In Singapore for example, the once rich Baba community’s fortunes took a dramatic turn for the worse during the Japanese Occupation. In fact, it has been noted by Turnbull (1977) that Babas lost their cultural heritage and unique social status during this period (15 Feb 1942 – 15 Aug 1945) as a result of the measures adopted by the Japanese. The Babas had to do tough labour and manual work which they never did in their lives such as ploughing and farming and as Chia puts it, “the ones who had softer skin suffered the most because the bigger the calluses grew”. These measures relegated their status and in turn led them to socialize with the Chinese. As time passed, Baba grandparents could then no longer force their rich culture and language upon their half or non-Baba grandchildren. It is also sad to note that although one can claim to have Baba blood running through the veins, he or she may not necessarily know how to speak Baba Malay.

Syntactic Features of Baba Malay

Kasi

Kasi in informal Malay is used as a main verb, whose lexical meaning is ‘to give’. In Baba Malay however, kasi is used in several other ways which are not used in Standard Malay. The influence of the different uses of kasi in Baba Malay which are absent in Standard Malay, comes from Hokkien. Kasi is the counterpart of the Hokkien ho, and in Baba Malay has all the grammatical functions of the latter based on their similarities. The four uses of kasi as a marker of causative constructions, a cause verb in causative constructions, the main verb and as an agent marker in passive constructions will be discussed.

Kasi as a marker of causative constructions

Kasi acts as a conjunctive connecting cause and consequence clauses. It means ‘to let, so that’. Hokkien ho has the same function and meaning.

bukak jok tu kasi dia kena ujan

Kasi as a cause verb in causative constructions

Kasi functions as the cause verb meaning ‘let, make’ which has a parallel in Hokkien ho. Kasi like ho can denote intention or non intention.

kita kasi tau kita mia kawan

(we kasi know our friend)

Glosses: We let our friend know

Hokkien : lan ho lan e peng iu zai

               (we ho our friend know)

Kasi can have a negative prefix attached to it i.e. tak kasi or can be preceded by an auxiliary i.e. pi kasi. Similarly, Hokkien ho can be negated i.e. bo ho or have an auxiliary before it i.e. khi ho. The function of kasi as the cause verb can be found in the Standard Malay equivalent beri.

Kasi as the main verb

Kasi and ho both functions as the main verb, meaning ‘ to give’.

kasi gua ayam

(give me chicken)

Hokkien: ho gua quae

               (give me chicken)

In informal Malay, there are similar constructions with kasi. In Standard Malay, kasi carries the function of the main verb too. This is the only function which Standard Malay kasi, Baba Malay kasi and Hokkien ho have in common.

Kasi as an agent marker in passive construction

dia kasi gua pukol

               (he ho I hit)

As the above example shows, kasi in Baba Malay and ho in Hokkien both function as the agent marker in passive constructions. The use of kasi and ho suggest adversity in this function. The action being done by the agent to the ‘undergoer’ is undesirable. This feature of adversity is a common one in many Asian languages.

In Standard Malay, the agent in passive constructions is marked by the preposition oleh. This however is a neutral passive, not an adversative one. The four functions of kasi in Baba Malay are analogous to the functions of ho in Hokkien.

Only one out of four possible usages of kasi in Baba Malay parallels the only usage of kasi in Standard Malay; that of the main verb. Kasi in Baba Malay has an equivalent in Malay’s beri as seen, but has no equivalents. While the links between kasi in Baba Malay and ho in Hokkien are consistent, the same cannot be said for the usages of kasi in Baba Malay and kasi in Standard Malay.

Kena

Kena is the equivalent of tioq in Hokkien in function but is regarded as colloquial Malay in form. In Standard Malay, kena is not used.

Kena used in passive constructions

Kena in Baba Malay is used to mark the passive construction. Kena is not followed immediately by the agent unlike in kasi. A passive construction containing kena may be agentless or the agent may be expressed in the post-verbal position. The agent might also precede kena. Baba Malay kena in this function has no Hokkien equivalent. Hokkien ho used in the passive construction is always followed by the agent, since it is an agent marker. Hokkien tioq in the passive construction does not require an agent.

Hokkien: i tioq may

(he tioq scolded)

Glosses: He was scolded

However such passive constructions containing tioq has restricted usage, and is used only to inferiors. In Taiwanese Hokkien, such usage is completely absent. This is the only function of kena that is not paralleled by Hokkien tioq or any other morpheme in Hokkien.

Kena used in incurred constructions

Kena in Baba Malay means ‘contact’ of an adversative, but non-volitional nature. The agent is not obvious and is not indicated. Hokkien tioq has the same meaning as Baba Malay kena in this function and is used in the same way as Baba Malay kena. In the previous function, it was stated that a construction like i tioq may was very rare. This is because the agent in the above construction was obvious though deleted. Hokkien tioq can only be used when the agent is not obvious.

dia kena racun

(he kena poison)

Glosses: He was poisoned

Hokkien : i tioq tok

(he was poisoned)

Kena as main verb

Kena in Baba Malay is analogous in function as the main verb to Hokkien tioq. Baba Malay kena and Hokkien tioq both mean to ‘hit a target or strike a target’.

gua kena capjiki

(I kena gambling game)

Glosses: I struck the winning combination in the gambling game

Hokkien : gua tioq capjiki

(I struck gambling game)

Kena and tioq carry positive, non-adversative connotations.

Kena as auxiliary

Kena is used as an auxiliary verb in Baba Malay, meaning ‘have to (do something)’.

gua kena pigi

(I kena go)

Glosses: I had to go (i.e. I had no choice)

Hokkien: gua tioq khi

(I tioq go)

The one difference between Baba Malay kena and Hokkien tioq is that while the latter may signify both the notions of obligatory and non-volition, kena signifies only non-volition. The twin semantic components of tioq are split and distributed in Baba Malay between two lexemes, kena (non-volition) and misti (obligation) as illustrated below.

kita kena jalan sana

(we kena walk there)kita misti jalan sana

(we misti walk there)

Glosses: We must walk there

The use of kena as auxiliary verb shows influence from H tioq, though the influence is not total. Of the four functions of kena, three of these parallel the functions of tioq. Kena used as a passive marker is an additional feature which Baba Malay kena has acquired in addition to the functions of Hokkien tioq. At times, kena and tioq parallel each other. On other occasions, kena is nearly equivalent to tioq. Thus influence of Hokkien in Baba Malay is considerable.

Mo

Mo in Baba Malay is the phonologically reduced version of mau. Mau is commonly used in Colloquial Malay, but is not used in Standard Malay. Baba Malay mau has several functions whose influence can be seen to come from Hokkien beq.

Mo as main verb

Mo is used as a main verb, whose lexical meaning is ‘want or desire’

lu mo brapa ayam

(you mo what many chickens?)

Glosses: How many chickens do you want?

The equivalent of mo as Main verb in Hokkien is ai. However general influence in mo does not come from Hokkien ai as ai does not parallel the later functions of mo, as we shall see.

Mo as auxiliary verb

Baba Malay mo can denote simple futurity, intention or expectation depending on the context in which it is used. Hokkien beq as an auxiliary verb parallels Baba Malay mo in this respect.

mo ujan; angkat payong

(mo rain; carry umbrella)

Glosses: It’s going to rain, carry an umbrella

Hokkien : beq lo hor; gia ji ki hor suah

(beq to rain; take an umbrella)

Ali mo beli buku

(Ali mo buy book)

Glosses: Ali wants to buy a book

Hokkien : Ali beq buay cek

(Ali beq buy book)

 

Pigi/Datang

Pigi which means ‘to go’ is a member of the class of full verbs in Baba Malay as well as the minor class of function-words. Pigi in its guise as a function-word has a parallel in the Hokkien khi also meaning ‘to go’. Both pigi and khi indicate ‘direction away from the speaker’ when juxtaposed with a verb of motion.

gua pake parka pigi sekola

(I wear parka pigi school)

Glosses: I wear a parka to school

Hokkien : gua cheng parka khi o-tng

(I wear parka khi school)

Pigi has as its complementary opposite the word datang (literally meaning ‘to come’) which is again paralleled by the Hokkien lai. Both mean direction towards the speaker when preceded by a motion verb.

Punya

Punya is widely used in Baba malay and is often phonologically reduced to mia. In Standard Malay, punya is a verb whose lexical meaning is ‘to possess’. It is never phonologically reduced. On the other hand, Baba Malay punya is a grammatical morpheme. Baba Malay punya has three main functions which parallel the functions of Hokkien e. Three uses of punya will be discussed.

Punya as possessive marker

This is the most common use of punya in Baba Malay. The syntactic structure containing punya as a possessive marker is Possessor punya Noun which is possessed. This is analogous to the way in which Hokkien e is used. Hokkien e too carries the function of a possessive marker. Punya and e are used as suffixes which attach to the Possessor.

dia mia menantu

(he mia daughter-in-law)

Glosses: His daughter-in-law

Hokkien : i e sin pu

(he e daughter-in-law)

lu mia sukak

(you mia like)

Glosses: As you wish

Hokkien : li e sukak

(you Ie wish)

Baba Malay punya and Hokkien e when used with pronouns form the genitive case and when used with nouns form possessives.

Punya as marker of modifying phrases

Baba Malay punya and Hokkien e both can be attached to phrases or clauses to turn them into modifiers. Thus, a phrase in Hokkien marked with e and a phrase in Baba Malay marked with punya are phrases which modify a noun. Punya like e can be a marker of temporal modifiers and markers of locative modifiers and a variety of other types of phrases. 

dulu mia orang

(past mia people)

Glosses: People of the past

Hokkien: korca e lang

(last time e people)

dekat Bedok mia skolar

(preposition place mia school)

Glosses: The school in Bedok

Hokkien : bedok e o-tng

 

jahat mia orang (wicked mia people)

Glosses: wicked people

Hokkien : pai sim e lang

(bad-hearted e people)

beli buku punya duit

(buy book punya money)

Glosses: the money for buying books

Hokkien : buay cek e lui

(buy book e money)

Punya as nominalizer

Punya when used with a deleted object functions as a nominalizer. Hokkien e can be used in a similar fashion too.

skrang mia

(now mia)

Glosses: that which belongs to the present

Hokkien : cit cun e…

(present e…)

The use of punya in Baba Malay shows consistent syntactic influence from Hokkien e. Baba Malay pays very little attention to the use of suffixes and prefixes which is essential in Malay grammar. Such prefixes and suffixes include ber, mo, me, per, ter, kan, nya, lah, kah.

dia baca buku

(he read book)

Glosses: He reads a book

Hokkien : yi kua cek

(he read book)

Malay : dia membaca buku

(he read book)

The lack of inflexional morphology is a prominent feature in most pidgins and creoles. This has its roots in the situations in which pidgins developed, whereby syntactic structures were simplified for limited functions.

 Word Order

The word order in Baba Malay has already been dealt with briefly when discussing punya and its usages. Lim (1988) remarks that word order in Baba Malay, as we have seen is patterned after Hokkien rather than Standard Malay in that modifiers of all types may precede the head nominal. These modifiers may be locative phrases, adjectives, temporal phrases or full sentences. If they precede the head nominal, they will have to occur with punya, which serves as a relativiser.

Adjective + Nominal

 

 

 

None of the above patterns are permissible in Malay, but they are fully permissible in Hokkien where the above examples may be regarded as noun-phrases containing an embedded sentence. This further strengthens the argument that the Hokkien substrate plays an influential role in the syntactic structures of Baba Malay.

Interestingly, another area or word order in which Baba Malay differs from Malay because it is patterned after Hokkien word order is found in the positioning of determiners in relation to the nominal. The most commonly cited example is the following.

Baba Malay : itu orang and Hokkien : hi e lang

(the person) (the person)

Glosses: the person

as compared to Malay : orang hitu

(person the)

It is Pakir’s claim that Baba Malay is a dialect of Malay, based on seeming similarities between Baba Malay and Standard Malay in syntax. She frequently compares Baba Malay with Colloquial Malay. However it should be noted that Colloquial Malay itself had absorbed external influences from many sources, one of which is Hokkien. Colloquial Malay and Baba Malay might both have grown out of a common pidgin in which Chinese played an important role in shaping. Hence in the above analysis, we have used Standard Malay as the superstrate language and the basis of comparison with Baba Malay. Although Standard Malay might have equivalents for different functions of a morpheme in Baba Malay, these functions are separated into different morphemes in Standard Malay. This is unlike Baba Malay, where a single morpheme is representative of collective functions. This syntactic phenomenon is found in Hokkien whereby a morpheme can have lexical and grammatical uses. In the discussion of kasi, kena, punya, pigi and mo, we have successfully shown that language shift from Hokkien into Baba Malay has been consistent and prominent. Processes characteristic of creolization, like lack of inflexional morphology and grammaticalization, are apparent in Baba Malay. Baba Malay’s syntax is also contrastive with Standard Malay’s syntax. These provide evidence of Baba Malay being a creole.

Lexis

It is obvious that the majority of the Baba Malay lexicon is of Malay origin, thus supporting the argument that Baba Malay derives its lexis from its lexifier language Malay. Grimes (1984) defines Baba Malay as “a creole developed from Malay with some Chinese borrowings.”

Png Poh Seng (1967) as quoted by in Pakir’s thesis conducted a survey to determine the number of Hokkien loans in Malay and concluded that there are about 400 Hokkien loanwords in Standard Malay. In fact, many of these Hokkien loanwords are also Baba Malay words, thus suggesting the possibility that Baba Malay might have taken some Hokkien words directly from its lexifier language (i.e. Malay) instead of borrowing them from Hokkien. Hence, Baba Malay ties to Malay might be stronger than are initially realized using the very evidence of some Hokkien borrowings in Baba Malay. Examples of Hokkien words which are present in both Baba Malay and Malay are given in Table 1 below.

Table 1: Hokkien words present in both Malay and Baba Malay

Examples	Meaning
Capjiki	a lottery of twelve numbers
Popia	Chinese spring rolls
Mi	Noodles
Tauge	Bean sprouts
Taucio	Preserved soy beans
Konsi	(a) company or firm (b) to share

 Although a large proportion of Baba Malay comes from its lexifier language, Standard Malay, Babas have cultural systems which are uniquely Chinese. Chinese loan words are necessary when referring to things which have Chinese origin. The Chinese loan-words which are mostly derived from Hokkien dialect include ‘nyun-lo‘ (incense pot), ‘teyian‘ (religious donation), ‘lap-cai‘ (bridal gifts), ‘hok‘ ( good fortune and happiness) and ‘sang-ke-m‘(female bridal attendant). Chinese loan words are also used when referring to domestic items, food, kinship and utensils. They include ‘keyah‘(kitchen shelves) from Hokkien ‘ke-a‘, ‘teko‘ (kettle), ‘capcai‘ (mixed vegetable dish) from Hokkien chap-chai, ‘yunko‘(mushroom) from Hokkien ‘hiu-ko‘, ‘binpoh‘(face towel), ‘loteng‘ (upstairs) from Hokkien ‘lau-teng‘ and ‘jeuk‘ (mattress) from Hokkien ‘jiok-a‘. It is no doubt the above are some examples of borrowings from Hokkien, but according to Pakir, the importance of the Hokkien element in Baba Malay has been over-estimated. The use of the Chinese loanwords does not make Baba Malay anymore Chinese-Malay than say, Malay is Portuguese-Malay because of the presence of several Portuguese loanwords in Malay. Since the bulk of the lexis in Baba Malay is still from Standard Malay, we can conclude that Baba Malay derives its lexis from Standard Malay, its one and only lexifier language. In fact, according to a lexical count of the data collected by Pakir, almost all of Baba Malay’s basic vocabulary and much of the exchange between Baba Malay speakers would have all or only Malay words. In addition, any of the conversations among Baba Malay speakers can be fairly understood by Malay speakers. In Pakir’s words, “Hokkien influence in the lexicon … is obvious, though shallow.”

The stand that Baba Malay derives its lexis from Standard Malay (its lexifier language) can also be seen from the fact that we can find loanwords from various sources (other than Hokkien) that are present in both Standard Malay and Baba Malay. Many of these loanwords must have entered into Standard Malay at an earlier stage and then come into Baba Malay later when the latter took its lexis from the former. Examples of foreign loanwords (other than Hokkien) shared by both Standard Malay and Baba Malay would include dunia ‘world’ from Arabic, kahwin ‘marry’ from Persian, kolam ‘pond’ from Tamil and bola ‘ball’ from Portuguese.

Conclusion

Some studies on Baba Malay are clearly permeated by the idea that recognizing the creole-like nature of Baba Malay would somehow diminish its status, that the idea of a creole as a corrupt, bastard language would endanger the originality of Baba Malay. But the historical circumstances under which Malay women cum Chinese men formed a community, coupled with the syntactic and lexical evidences unearthed throughout this paper clearly point to the direction that Baba Malay should be treated as a creole.

We do not deny that there has always been a stigmatised view against pidgins and creoles. Nevertheless, what continues to fascinate us is that the existence of pidgins and creoles demonstrate the amazing innate capacities of mankind for communication. Two groups of people with absolutely no prior contact could give birth to a distinctively new language which is representative of a unique culture. Baba Malay as a dual-input creole is one such proof of mankind’s linguistic and communicative abilities. 

Bibliography

Comments(2)

To modern men, old stories in the form of myths, fairy tales and legends are often regarded as a genre far removed from their ordinary lives. As such, they are read mainly for their entertainment value. It is indeed sad to note this fact because old stories demonstrate the rich imagination of the ancient people and via the motifs embedded, are reflective of human life as a whole.

Of particular interest to this paper will be a comparative analysis of a Japanese story ‘The Blind Serpent Wife’ (taken from Dorson’s book “Folk Legends of Japan”) and an English story ‘The Goose Girl’ (taken from the website http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~spok/grimmtmp/066.txt). Via the transformation motif found in both these stories, I hope to be able to shed some light on the link these stories have with our world and the lessons we can draw from them.

OUTLINE OF ‘THE BLIND SERPENT WIFE’

A young doctor lived with his mother at Fukae-mura. One summer day when it began to rain heavily, a beautiful girl took shelter at the village headmaster’s house. Through conversations with her, he thought her suitable to be the bride of the doctor, as the doctor’s mother has asked him to be the matchmaker. Very soon, the doctor married the girl and a baby was born in due time.

One day, when the doctor’s mother opened the door into the girl’s room, she was astonished to see a big serpent sleeping in the centre of the room coiled around the baby. She told her son about it when he came back. The next day, he too peeped into the room and saw the same sight his mother had described. He divorced his wife and she told him she was rescued by him several years ago and had come back to repay his kindness. She added that if he could not find a good nurse for the baby, he could come to the pond at Mt. Fugen to look for her. She then left in tears.

Failing to find a good nurse, the doctor went to the pond at Mt. Fugen to look for his divorced wife. She appeared in the form of a woman and gouged out one of her eyeballs. When the baby licked it, milk came out. The doctor took the eyeball and left the pond with the baby. However, samurais robbed him of the eyeball on his way through the mountain. Distressed by the baby’s cries, he returned to the pond to look for the girl. Despite knowing that she would be blind, she gouged out the other eyeball. The same gang of samurais again robbed the second eyeball. Again the doctor returned to the pond in distress.

When the girl learnt of what happened, her rage was beyond description. A great earthquake then occurred throughout Mt. Fugen.

OUTLINE OF ‘THE GOOSE GIRL’

A widowed queen had a beautiful daughter who was betrothed to a prince in a distant country. On the marriage day, the queen gave many valuable gifts, which included a golden cup, a waiting-maid, a talking horse called Falada and three drops of her own blood tied in a white handkerchief to her daughter.

After riding for some time, the princess felt thirsty and asked the maid to get her some water in the golden cup. The maid told her to fetch the water herself. Later on, the princess was again thirsty and the maid gave the same reply. As the princess lay down and drank from the stream, the handkerchief with the three drops of blood fell into the stream and disappeared. The maid then demanded that the princess wear the rags while she took the royal clothes and the horse for herself. The princess was also to swear not to tell anyone about what happened with the threat of death. However, Falada saw and remembered everything.

When they arrived at the royal palace, the prince thought the maid in royal clothes was his bride and took her into the castle. However, the old king noticed the pretty girl in rags and thinking her to be the false bride’s companion, assigned her to work with another boy named Conrad to tend the geese. The false bride asked the king to cut off Falada’s head for fear that it would speak the truth one day. When the girl learnt this, she offered the man employed in the task a piece of gold to nail up Falada’s head in the dark gateway to the town.

Every morning when she passed the gateway with Conrad, she spoke to the head and it replied. While tending the geese, Conrad tried to pluck some of the girl’s golden hair but could not succeed as a wind blew his hat away after she recited a rhyme. The same three events happened over the next few days. Conrad complained to the king and peeping behind a bush in the field, the latter saw the same events. The king questioned the girl but she said she could not tell any human being, under the oath of death. He told her to tell the stove instead. She related the whole story to the stove, while the king hid behind it to eavesdrop. Knowing the truth, the king had the girl dressed back in royal clothes and told his son that the goose girl was the true bride. The king then tricked the maid by asking her the sentence servants should receive when they deceived their masters. She thought it a simple question and by answering it, fell into the trap. She was then dealt with according to her description. After the sentence, the prince married the true bride and lived happily ever after.

TRANSFORMATIONS

Transformations occur many times throughout the two stories. Here, it is worthwhile to note the two distinct levels of transformations, namely voluntary transformation and involuntary transformation.

Voluntary transformation takes place when the protagonists revert back their original form. In ‘The Blind Serpent Wife’, this is evident when the girl changes back into a serpent when she is all alone with her baby in the room. This can be seen as something innate, the idea of returning to nature. This mode of voluntary transformation is reversed in two other instances in the story. When she comes back to repay the doctor’s kindness and when he goes to the pond at Mt. Fugen to seek her help to nurse their baby, she chooses to take the form of a human being so as not to scare him with her reptile appearance. Interestingly, this contradicts Lane’s claim that transformations occur “in the response to curses or blessings, because of the violation of the taboos … or because of the possession of magic objects, i.e. enablers”. (Lane, p.24). As we have seen, it is really a matter of what form the character chooses to transform back or into, not because of external factors.

The second aspect of the transformation motif is involuntary transformation, something caused by external factors beyond the control of the protagonist. In ‘The Goose Girl’, we can follow the progress of the union of consciousness and unconsciousness by observing the images and noting the stages of the development of the story. Outwardly, when one first reads the story, it tells of how the princess is forced by the maid to take on the guise of a goose girl when she loses the trappings of her identity (her royal clothes). A second reading of the same story could perhaps reveal a deeper meaning of transformation from maidenhood to womanhood. The princess is forced to learn from her trials and tribulations, and thus grows up in the process. She can only succeed in restoring her own true identity when she is capable of identifying with her animus and uses it to attain full maturity. This identification process is set into motion at the point when the three drops of blood in the white handkerchief fall into the stream.

Interestingly, the three drops of blood can also be seen as the three important stages of transformation in a woman’s life – namely menstruation, pregnancy and lactation. In the words of the three drops of blood, ‘if your mother knew this, it would break her heart’. They speak of suffering. This emphasises the psychological and spiritual pain that must be endured in all transformations. Both mother and daughter suffer but undeniably, the latter suffers more. The former loses her beloved daughter who is to be married and the latter suffers under the thumb of her maid. But suffering causes her to reconcile with her animus which teaches her wisdom and the need for action. We see this happening when the goose girl takes initiative to pay to have Falada’s head nailed up in the gateway. This is then followed by the incident in the open fields when Conrad tries to pluck her golden hair. But it is Conrad who is defeated, as she summons the wind to blow his hat away. She is empowered in the fields of Mother Nature. In both cases, these signify conscious connections with the powers of the transforming feminine. She initiates actions for the first time in her life, thanks to the cruelty of the maid that acts as an external factor to her involuntary transformation. Only when she had travelled a “psychic distance” (Lane, p.11) in a spiritual journey can she become wiser and a more capable human.

PREDOMINANCE OF THE MATERNAL PRINCIPLE

A common thread that runs through both stories is the predominance of the maternal principle. The protagonists in both stories are females. This is particularly interesting considering the fact that both stories were obviously products of the premodern society, a time when traditional, male-oriented values were the norm.

In ‘The Blind Serpent Wife’, it is worthwhile to note that the image of the Great Mother can be interpreted in two ways. First, the scene where the girl reverts back to her serpent form and coils herself around her child reminds one of the prevalence of amae in Japanese society. The primary agent of socialisation in Japanese society is between that of mother and child. We hear of terms like “kyoiku mama”, “mother fixation” and “mazakon” coined by Takie Lebra and other leading Japanese scholars. This close physical bonding where the child is dependent on the mother is perhaps best exemplified by the notion of skinship, displayed in activities like co-sleeping, co-bathing and carrying the baby on the mother’s back. When the doctor’s mother discovers the girl’s identity, she immediately informs her son. These instances are examples of the Great Mother as a protecting figure of her child, not wanting any harm to come to the child. At the pond in Mt. Fugen, the nourishing qualities of the Great Mother is again witnessed when the serpent turned wife willingly gouges out her eyeballs, not once but twice to provide milk for her child. This is despite the fact that she knows she will become blind as a consequence.

Conversely, the negative side of the Great Mother as destroyer too comes into play at the end of the story when she is unable to contain her rage at man who continue to plunder nature. She learns from the doctor of the loss of both eyeballs to the samurais and her rage was such that it resulted in a massive earthquake throughout Mt. Fugen. The destructive qualities of Great Mother are in sharp contrast to the nurturing, protective side seen earlier.

‘The Goose Girl’ starts off by showcasing the princess, who although beautiful, is undeniably shallow in character. The queen has protected her all her life to the extent that she expects to be served. Take for instance the two occasions when she felt thirsty and instead of going to the stream to get the water on her own, she commands her maid to get it for her. However, outside the protective walls of the palace, her protecting agent in the form of the queen is absent and this is when the maid refuses to serve her. As Jung puts it, this is the beginning of the reversal of the shadow (the maid) over the ego (the princess). She can no longer drink passively from the golden mother cup (the literal object, and metaphorically meaning the breast), but must lie on the earth and drink directly from the stream of life. She has to learn to be close to nature to feel the therapeutic balm of its soothing effect.

The princess has yet to come to terms with her own shadow and this is the attitude towards the unconscious that needs to be changed. When she loses the handkerchief with the three drops of blood, she has lost her conscious bond with her mother. The maid who witnesses this loss gloats over it as she knows she now has power over the princess who without the drops of blood is ‘weak and helpless’. Now the shadow reversal over the ego is complete. The negative aspect of the Great Mother is at work here. Just as the Great Mother is willing to sacrifice all and provide for her child, she is also capable of taking back what she thinks the child does not deserve. In this case, the maid forces the princess to surrender her royal clothes, her horse and by doing so, usurps the claim to royalty.

SECONDARY ROLE OF THE PATERNAL PRINCIPLE

The paternal principle, which plays a minute secondary role in both stories, is worth noting. In ‘The Blind Serpent Wife’, the doctor, together with the samurais could be said to be men who plunder from Mother Nature, robbing her of the gifts of life – in the form of the two eyeballs. This is a minor observation but in Kawai’s words, “the heroic establishment of the masculine ego might cause the destruction of Mother Nature” (Kawai, p.102).

In ‘The Goose Girl’, we are told that the queen is a widow and thus, the princess lacks a father role model in her growing years. This again brings to mind issue of Japanese society being a “fatherless society” as the child hardly gets to see his father owing to his late night entertaining or being posted to other provinces. Because of this deficiency, the goose girl cannot develop her animus until she comes into contact with the old king, father of the prince she has been betrothed to. As discussed earlier, he is the catalyst that allows her animus to surface, spurring her to take actions for the first time in her life. Conversely, Conrad is a parallel to the men in ‘The Blind Serpent Wife’. He is a threat to the goose girl’s emerging consciousness when he tries to pluck her golden hair. But he is no match for her as she has come to terms with her own consciousness and is able to utilise the rhythms of nature to summon the wind in blowing his hat away each time. Dealing with Conrad strengthens the development of her animus. The prince reminds me of an early version of the goose girl. He fits the picture of a young man unconscious of the dark side of the anima. He sees the false bride in royal clothes on the horse and assumes her to be his bride. He is still unable to tell appearance from reality.

THE FORBIDDEN CHAMBER

Ironically, the sacred space in both stories happens to be the forbidden chamber that marks the turning point of the events. Although the protagonists did not specifically request the doctor cum his mother and the king respectively not to peep in or listen, there is a price to pay for having done so.

When both the doctor and his mother peep into the girl’s room on two separate occasions and see her in her serpent form, the consequence is that the doctor confronts his serpent wife and divorces her, while she confesses everything and leaves in sorrow, never to return. This reminds one of the monono aware endings in other Japanese stories.

In ‘The Goose Girl’, the king hides behind the bushes in the fields and notes the reasons for Conrad’s complaints. Next, at the king’s suggestion, the goose girl climbs into the stove to reveal the truth while he hides behind it to eavesdrop. The king makes known to the goose girl that he knows of the truth and is the one who reinstates the goose girl to her original status. In both stories, although both transgressors are not punished, it should be noted that only the goose girl gains from having her sacred space transgressed. The same cannot be said of the serpent wife.

EXAMINING THE ENDINGS

As expected of any fairy tale, ‘The Goose Girl’ ends with a happy ending with the prince and princess living happily ever after. “The beauty of perfection is achieved by renouncing everything that is ugly” (Kawai, p.120). The ugly element, epitomised by the maid harbouring ill intentions has to be dealt with and eliminated before a happy ending can take place. This is the sharpest contrast to ‘The Blind Serpent Wife’. This Japanese tale ends with a tone of sorrow. “The beauty of completeness contains things which are not necessarily beautiful” (Kawai, p.120). The serpent’s wrath at the end of the story culminating in a great earthquake throughout Mt. Fugen is not a prefect, but it is complete. It provides a suitable closure, atypical of most other Japanese tales.

CONCLUSION

What is truly remarkable is that these two stories, written in England and Japan respectively to cater to different audiences have so many similarities confirms one fact. They have revealed that we can learn “the inner problems of human beings and of the right solutions to the predicaments in any society” (Bettelheim, p.5). Customs and traditions may be culture bound and very diverse on the surface, but deep down they speak to all mankind in one universal voice. While we identify with the protagonists, follow their trials and tribulations, weep when they fail and clap when they succeed, we learn to find true meaning in our lives. In the words of Lane, stories “mirror our own growth, rites of passages, gains, losses and eventual ascension to adulthood” (p.34). Stories are indeed treasure houses and there are many more out there waiting for us to discover.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bettelheim, Bruno. The Uses of Enchantment. New York: Knopf, 1976.

Dorson, Richard M. Folk Legends of Japan. Tokyo: C.E. Tuttle, 1962.

Eliade, Mircea. The Sacred and Profane. San Diego: Harcoury Brace Jovanovich, 1959.

Kawai, Hayao. Dreams, Myths and Fairy Tales in Japan. Switzerland: Daimon, 1995.

Internet Website http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~spok/grimmtmp/066.txt for ‘The Goose Girl’ text.

Lane, Marcia. Picturing The Rose: A Way of looking at Fairy Tales. New York: H.W.Wilson Co., 1994.

Stein, Murray and Lionel Corbett, eds. Psyche’s Stories: Modern Jungian Interpretations of Fairy Tales. Illinois: Chiron Publications, 1993. 

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