The essence of language as a human activity lies not in its ability to reflect the world, but in its characteristic of creating commitment…” (Winnograd and Flores, 1986)

INTRODUCTION

It appears that most people take the idea of understanding natural language for granted. Yet, language is often filled with ambiguities, double meanings, context sensitive observations and hidden implications. If humans already find it difficult not to misinterpret another speaker’s utterance, it would be more so a Herculean task for a computer to achieve this. In fact, in her book Artificial Intelligence and Natural Man, Margaret Boden is somewhat scathing of people’s naivety in accepting the idea that a computer can understand human language, even with its subtle variations and in-built knowledge.

AIMS

Of particular interest to this paper is a discussion of ELIZA which will act as the starting point for an evaluation of the nature of knowledge required for language understanding.

ELIZA UNVEILED

One of the pioneers of language computer programs which made natural language conversation with a computer possible was ELIZA. ELIZA was developed by Joseph Weizenbaum in 1966 to model the language behaviour of a Rogerian psychotherapist talking to a patient. In fact, ELIZA became a hot topic in the psychiatric community as a possible tool for therapy. On first impressions, ELIZA would come across as intelligent because of its ability to mimic human conversation. Furthermore, ELIZA’s breadth of in-built “knowledge” is admirable as it ranges from family, dieting to drugs and religion. Users became emotionally involved with ELIZA and some believed that it demonstrated a general solution to the problem of the understanding of natural language by computers.

However, to claim that ELIZA is intelligent is to trivialise human interaction and worth. The success of the simulated intelligence depends heavily on the notion that the user has a fairly restricted notion of the expected response from the system. All ELIZA does is to pattern match incoming typed keywords against stored prompts in its database. It could only manipulate syntax (grammar) and check for some key words. For instance, the response to the statement `men are all alike’ was `in what way?’. Its replies were only as good as the programmer’s ingenuity in devising standardised replies. No original thinking was required at all. To even suggest that ELIZA had passed the famed Turing test is a mockery in itself. In instances when the user is deliberately uncooperative and poses questions and responses that are not part of ELIZA’s “knowledge”, ELIZA’s façade begins to crumble. When it encounters unknown words, it generates generalised and sometimes unrelated responses after checking earlier stored inputs.

In general, natural language understanding programmes require three basic components, namely knowledge about the structure of the language (linguistic knowledge), knowledge about the structure of the world (world knowledge) and knowledge about the reasoning capability of human beings.

Knowledge about the structure of the language (linguistic knowledge)

As discussed above, even though ELIZA is capable of manipulating syntax to a certain degree by substituting ‘I am…’ with ‘…you are…’, it still lacks phonological, morphological, semantic and pragmatic knowledge. There are many different types of understanding that humans do naturally when they speak and write sentences.

Firstly, phonological distinctions such as the identification of stress and intonation will be more effective to help programmes like ELIZA respond to the stressed portion of the sentence. Hence, there should be phonological elements that the programme can detect. These can also be used to identify the emotional state of the utterance. This is where humans can detect differences in the way sentences and words are said. At the end of a question we often raise our voice. We stress important words and sarcastically dismiss others.

Secondly, there is a morphological understanding. This is where we recognise smaller parts of words and realise their meaning. An example of this would be happy, and happiness. We know what happy means, and we also know how the meaning changes when we add “ness”. The “ness” makes happy a noun instead of an adjective.

Thirdly, ELIZA-like systems have no semantic representation of the content of either the user’s input or the reply. Nothing can be more difficult for a computer than to ‘understand’ meaning. At the sentence level, semantics can be hidden or implied. But taking the entire context into consideration, meanings of an utterance will be less problematic to decipher. Yet ELIZA lacks the complex ability to function at the semantic level. Thus, implied meanings will be lost, ellipsis will be greeted by ELIZA’s response to be more ‘generous with words’ and the true essence of natural language understanding will be completely omitted.

Next, the quality of ELIZA’s response is limited by the sophistication of the ways in which they can process the input text at a syntactic level. For example, the number of templates available is a serious limitation. But we humans understand syntactically. This means we know how to form words into correct structures and phrases using the grammar for our language. We also know how to understand sentences that are not correct in this context. “Go I must, late it is” is not a correct sentence syntactically, but the meaning can easily be interpreted by an English speaker.

In addition, we are also imbued with pragmatic understanding. This is where the same sentence could be interpreted differently in different situations. The simple statement “I’m cold” might mean that I need to put on a jacket if I were outside. If I were inside it might mean that I want someone to turn up the heat. It could also mean (if it were summer) that I’m now comfortable being cold, because previously I was not.

The understanding of discourse is another skill we have. This is the ability to get a meaning from a whole set of sentences that are related. We will not always extract the same meaning from a paragraph of text if we don’t read the sentences in the correct order. This includes a temporal aspect of understanding.

More importantly, the linguistic knowledge component of natural language understanding needs to incorporate all these understandings with the language’s specific grammar in order to be able to interpret sentences correctly. After all, the different components under linguistics are all related in one way or another. Currently, ELIZA’s responses impose no structure on the conversation. Each response is based entirely on the current input. Any sense of intelligence depends strongly on the coherence of the conversation as judged by the user.

Knowledge about the structure of the world (world knowledge)

Even though artificial intelligence programmes like ELIZA may impress us with its breadth of “knowledge”, an important distinction needs to be made between knowledge and intelligence. A machine like ELIZA may store knowledge, but it need not necessarily possess intelligence.

Besides the fact that knowledge is indispensable, it is also volumous, hard to characterise accurately and constantly changing. After all, no one can deny the fact that knowledge about objects, events, procedures and experiences vary from one person to another. ELIZA shows how easy it is to create and maintain the illusion of understanding, hence perhaps of its supposed credibility. A certain danger lurks here. Although the breadth of “knowledge” encoded in ELIZA’s database is impressive, it is seriously lacking in depth. In other words, ELIZA tries to be all encompassing in the fields it has been trained for but this is seriously one of its biggest weakness. A user who decides to engage ELIZA in a conversation at a deeper level will be frustrated by ELIZA’s incoherent responses or eccentric nonsense. Similarly, a user who converses with ELIZA with regard to a very specialised domain, for example the use of interrogatives in language immediately discovers after two responses that it is not capable of sustaining such talk. Thus, it might be wiser to constrain the scope of ELIZA and to define a specific domain or field in which it can be thoroughly trained for (as is the objective of the modified ELIZA programme).

Knowledge about the reasoning capability of human beings

Another way of building a knowledge structure into a computer is to give the computer a mechanism for understanding why people do the things they do. Artificial intelligence computer programmes need to be trained to understand how humans formulate goals, the kinds of goals people in an event might want to achieve and the plans to achieve these goals. Presently, ELIZA only assumes the pose of understanding the user. In actual fact, it is the user’s contribution to his conversational partner all sorts of background knowledge, insights and reasoning ability. They manifest themselves inferentially in the interpretations he makes of the offered responses.

The crucial test of understanding underpins that it is not sufficient just for a computer programme to continue a conversation robustly, it must also be able to draw valid conclusions from what it is being told. Language understanding is not only a fixed relationship between a representation and the things represented, but also a commitment to carry out a dialogue within the full horizons of both speaker and hearer in a way that permits new distinctions to emerge. In Weizenbaum’s words, ‘ELIZA in its use so far has had as one of its principal objectives the concealment of its lack of understanding. But to encourage its conversational partner to offer inputs from which it can select remedial information, it must reveal its misunderstanding. The switch of objectives from the concealment to the revelation of misunderstanding is seen as a precondition to making an ELIZA-like programme the basis for an effective natural language man-machine communication system’ (Weizenbaum, 1966).

In conclusion, computer programmes like ELIZA can more realistically be compared to a useful replica workbook than to human beings. Nevertheless, ELIZA in its most elementary form is still a valuable tool as it enables us to understand the mechanisms of how humans function via the integration of linguistic knowledge, world knowledge and our reasoning capability.

In the course of modifying ELIZA for this paper, one realises that it is possible to believe that natural language understanding might be feasible in the next ten years for the following reasons. Although ELIZA-like systems have often been seen in the coldest possible light as being a translating processor, we cannot deny the fact that it applied rules, especially the grammar rules which have been in-built religiously. The only thing stopping this from being useful is the computer’s lack of context judging. With the availability of large online corpora, enough data can be collected so that context can be applied to parsing language, and computers will be able to understand the intention of the user’s statements.

Secondly, we have already modelled our programming languages after our own languages which pave the way for a more general object oriented approach for designing computer software. This means we are arriving closer to a common language that both humans and computers can understand. This may be the vital key to the success of natural language understanding. After all, we cannot expect computers to understand our language unless we understand it fully ourselves.

Bibliography

Greene, Judith. Language Understanding: A Cognitive Approach. Philadelphia: Open University Press, 1985.

Weizenbaum, Joseph. ‘ELIZA – A Computer Program for the Study of Natural Language Communication between Man and Machine’ in Communications of the ACM, Vol. 9, No. 1. New York: ACM Publishing, 1966.

Kachru’s discussion of the inner, outer and expanding circles has been the accepted bedrock in the classification of English as a world language. But of all the major varieties of English, much of the focus has always been on describing British English and American English (varieties from the inner circle) extensively in much detail. Other varieties of English, especially those found in the outer circle have been denigrated and marginalised.

However, in recent years, there is a clear indication of a reversal trend as increased efforts have been made to give a systematic and comprehensive description of the new varieties of English which are all valuable in their own rights. Among the non-native varieties of English that have been tacitly recognised, the Indian variety of English is of specific interest to this paper. The chief reason for choosing India is buttressed by the fact that according to The Oxford Companion to the English Language, “an estimated 30m people (4% of the population) regularly use English, making India the third largest English-speaking country in the world. In addition, beyond this number is a further, unquantifiably large range of people with greater or less knowledge of the language and competence in its use” (McArthur, 1998).

AIMS

In examining this particular variety, this paper has four main aims in mind. Firstly, it seeks to examine the sociolinguistic situation in India. This is of utmost importance as it will then equip one with the necessary knowledge to test if Ooi’s Concentric Circles Model (cf. Ooi, 1998; Ooi, 2000) can be applied in the Indian context. In the event that this model holds true, the third and fourth goals will then be to determine if words used in the Indian variety of English can be graded accordingly and whether a diglossic situation exists in India.

METHODOLOGY

There are three main sources of linguistic evidence employed in this paper, namely the corpus, citational and introspective aspects. A plurality of sources serves to complement one another to give a better understanding and more accurate description of the Indian variety of English.

The corpus evidence is gathered from The Times of India which is available online. The Times of India newspaper was chosen because it is the largest and most-read newspaper in India. A total number of 119 articles were collected over a fifteen-day period (from 14 Aug to 28 Aug 2000). News articles from the political, infotech, health/science, sports and entertainment arenas; alongside with letters written by the public and interviews pertaining to music, cinema, politicians cum new technologies were gleaned with equal weightage given to each category. This was done so as to avoid the findings from being skewed and to ensure the corpus was maximally representative of the linguistic situation in India. The fifteen days of materials were then subjected to a WordSmith Tools analysis.

Second, the main citational sources were taken from published materials like books, magazines, online articles and dictionaries such as ‘Indian and British English: A Handbook of Usage and Pronunciation’, ‘The Indianization of English: The English Language in India’, ‘Stardust Magazine’ and seven articles pertaining to Indian English written by academics from the Internet.

In addition, an introspective source that would provide a first-hand emic perspective of the linguistic situation in India was valued. The insider’s perspective came from two informants who are from North India and South India respectively. They are Dr. Gyanesh Kudaisya and Dr. SP Thinnappan, both lecturers from the Department of South Asian Studies, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, National University of Singapore. Both lecturers were also in a better position to grade the lexical items according to their meanings and context of usage.

The term Indian English is widely used but is a subject of controversy. Some scholars argue that it labels an established variety with an incipient or actual standard while others feel that the kinds of English used in India are too varied – both socially and geographically; and often too deviant or too limited, to be lumped together as one variety. They also argue that no detailed description has been made of the supposed variety and that the term is therefore misleading and ought not to be used.

However, the length of time that English has been in India, its importance and its range, rather than militating against such a term, make the term essential for an adequate discussion of the place of the language in Indian life, culture and its sociolinguistic context. Besides, Indian English is used widely as the language of formality and legislation. It has long since established itself as a respected equal to the sub-continent’s other indigenous languages. Furthermore, it functions as a vital lingua franca, acting as the social glue binding together the various regions of this vast country. This refutes Macaulay’s view strongly that ‘a single shelf of a good European library was worth the whole native literature of India and Arabia’ and poured scorn on every aspect of Indian culture (Philipson, 1992).

Interestingly, Indian English has improvised and innovated so much to the extent that it is referred to as Hinglish – a kind of pidgin English that draws from Hindi and other local languages. According to Saraf, ‘Hinglish shot into prominence thanks to the burgeoning post-reforms mass media in India. This is not without any reason since Hinglish has been identified as the language of the youth of a ‘liberal’ India Inc.’ (Saraf) The Indian community has showed a special penchant for incorporating words from the regional languages into their speech and subsequently their writings thus ensuring their place in the English language. In particular, the rapid growth in the mass media industry, especially satellite TV (best exemplified by ZEE TV and NEWS) and Hinglish pop have added a new dimension to Hinglish.

The increasing pervasiveness of Hinglish is not just a consequence of multi-cultural and multi-lingual contexts functioning in an era of political correctness. It has been helped along by certain precise and concrete political events cum economic forces in the mid-eighties in India. These conditions intervene actively in the evolution of this language at various levels, particularly, semiotically, in the creation of new role models, myths and symbols which are seen as fresh perceptions of the Indian image.

While some argue that Indian English and Hinglish are interchangeable, this paper seeks to differ. In this paper, Indian English will refer specifically to the variety that is used in formal contexts such as education, politics and law. In contrast, Hinglish will refer to the variety used in informal contexts such as conversations with friends and family.

THE CONCENTRIC CIRCLES MODEL

Ooi argues that ‘one can think of 5 main groups typifing the range of language use in a nativised language situation’ (Ooi, 1998). This section will evaluate this claim by applying the model to English usage in India, of which only Groups B, C, D and E words are of particular interest.

Group B: Words of English Origin used in Formal Situations

Figure 1: Concordance listing for innings (from The Times of India online)

In Figure 1 above, we see instances where the word innings is not used in the prototypical sense which the Collins Cobuild defines as ‘a period in a game of cricket during which a particular player or team is batting.’ Instead, in the Indian context, although the form of the word remains unchanged, innings takes on a new meaning that is used to characterise the attempt (by an entertainer) at success in the entertainment field in lines 1 and 2. An ocular scan reveals that the co-text of innings to the right-hand side is always a prepositional phrase, characterised by the collocation in and the colligation Bollywood, the major Indian film industry in India. The left-hand side of the node is also determined by the ordinal number collocate second and a pronoun colligation. However, the meaning of innings changes when we examine the co-text of lines 3 and 4. In these instances, innings refers to the success an entertainer gets after a period of time in the entertainment field. The colligation short and the collocation Bollywood serves to disambiguate this second meaning from the first.

Nevertheless, despite which meaning we are looking at, it can be observed that the semantic prosody reflects an ambition either to succeed or to continue one’s success in Bollywood.

Figure 2: Concordance listing for tricolour (from The Times of India online)

Not ‘any three coloured flag or a flag having three coloured stripes’ in India can be termed tricolour. The term is reserved solely to refer to the national flag of India, which has three colours – green, orange and white. In lines 1, 2, 3, 5 and 6, one notes that the tricolour collocates or colligates with a verb on the left-hand side, in these instances with flying, displaying or sending up. Tricolour also collocates very strongly with a preposition acting as a locative marker to the right-hand side. However in line 4, tricolour becomes a proper noun and is capitalised. This stemmed from the fact that there had been much press coverage about Indians not according the tricolour with proper respect to the extent that the issue and views on the matter became ‘the Tricolour controversy’, referring specifically to this case. Because the tricolour is the national flag, the semantic prosody is one of respect. In this concordance listing, the debate over the treatment of the flag arose owing to views that it was not being treated disrespectfully.

There are two other interesting word usage patterns worth mentioning. Firstly, one does not hold up (meaning ‘respect’) ‘their national flag with great respect and pride’. The use of hold up seeks to remind one of a delay (someone or something holds you up) or a robbery (hold up a bank) or the action of moving one’s hand upwards. Next, one does not flag off (meaning ‘start’) a controversy. One only flags off a race.

Figure 3: Concordance listing for chargesheeted (from The Times of India online)

The third specimen lexical item chargesheet, which consists of two independent English words, namely charge and sheet is unique only to Indian English. According to my informants, the compounding of two words to form a new one is commonly found in India and this marks the creativeness of Indian English in coining new forms.

As evident from Figure 3, chargesheeted is used as an intransitive verb to refer to ‘offenders who were charged in court or their names placed on the charge sheet’. Its usage is restricted solely to legal discourse. As such, we would expect the co-text to contain lexical items pertaining to the crimes, such as ‘embezzlement’ and the collocation or colligation to be a number, either referring to the year he or she was chargesheeted or the length of sentence. The semantic prosody reflects the negative, undesirable side of human beings.

Group C: Words or Hybrids of non-English origin used in formal situations

In this concordance listing, the word benami is used as an attributive adjective, acting as a pre-modifier to the head of the noun phrase in all three instances. One can hazard a guess to its meaning which conjures to mind the ‘illegal’ nature of the transaction. With a negative connotation attached to the meaning of the word, it is not surprising to find the illegal activity ‘black money (scheme)’ which acts as a very strong compound collocate alongside benami. On the contrary, one feels that the usage of benami in lines 1 and 3 is redundant. After all, the occurrence of the compound ‘black money’ already seeks to remind one that the money comes from illegal means. This is further strengthened by the semantic prosody which reflects a particular attitude (often negative) towards benami.

Figure 5: Concordance listing for azadi (from The Times of India online)

Azadi in Figure 5 is used as a noun, which means freedom or independence. What is most obvious from the concordance listing is that azadi collocates frequently with the preposition of, functioning as the noun in the postposed prepositional phrase. In other instances like in lines 8, 9, 13, 14 and 15, azadi is portrayed as the goal to be attained (eg. provide full azadi, Hurriyat’s azadi, concrete step towards azadi.) Other lexical items that are commonly found alongside azadi include ‘autonomy’, ‘law’, ‘order’ and ‘independence’, suggesting that the successful attainment of azadi will result in these other norms or these other norms will help give rise to azadi.

What is interesting in the context of usage is the formation of ministry of azadi. In this case, the ministry is the actor and azadi is the goal they hope to achieve. In other cases, it is the man on the street who wishes for azadi. Yet this dichotomy reveals that the ministry and the man on the street will differ significantly with regard to their own definition of what full azadi or true azadi symbolises. Nevertheless, the semantic prosody indicates a deep sense of yearning and positive hope.

Figure 6: Concordance listing for insaniyat (from The Times of India online)

The lexical item insaniyat (meaning humanity) functions as the noun in the postposed prepositional phrase marked by of. The colligation which really functions as the head of the noun phrase is defined by the domain, limitations or foundation upon which insaniyat is built upon. One can talk or construe notions of insaniyat, but ultimately what the boundaries of insaniyat differs from person to person. The semantic prosody is one that reflects the opinion(s) of different actors with regard to insaniyat.

Group D: Words of English origin used in informal situations

Figure 7: Concordance listing for starrers (from The Times of India online)

As evident from Figure 7, starrers is a fascinating construction which is a demonstration of creativeness of Hinglish. It is formed from the lemma star, from which the agentive form –er is added and the –s added to denote plurality. In both instances, it collocates so strongly with multi that both multi and starrers have become fused together as a compound. This noun compound refers to a movie which has many famous celebrities acting in it.

According to one of my informants, it is ironic that although both multi-starrers and Bollywood have close links with each other and the film industry as a whole, only the latter has been elevated in status and accepted in formal situations. In contrast, an utterance like ‘the show has multi-starrers’ is only reserved for informal usage.

…Saturday because that’s the day they cut the birds at the chicken farm.

If you don’t like the word, cut it.

My wife wants me to cut out my moustache.

Figure 8: Concordance listing for cut (from Indian and British English)

Although cut, as used in all three instances in Figure 8 continues to be used as a verb, it can never be found in formal speech nor writing. One notes the polysemous meanings of cut as it moves from that of ‘slaughter’ in line 1 to ‘remove’ in line 2 to ‘shave’ in line 3. As cut behaves as a transitive verb, it has to take a collocation in the form of a noun phrase to the right-hand side. However, the collocational strength between cut and the collocate it takes is weak and one cannot predict with certainty what else a Hinglish speaker can cut. According to my informants, one can even cut (meaning ‘crack’) a joke or cut (meaning ‘solve’) the problem among many others. The semantic prosody reflects an attempt to try to make things better by undertaking a remedying or appropriate action.

Figure 9: Concordance listing for funterprise (from The Times of India online)

Perhaps one of the most interesting lexical item is funterprise, a word produced by the process of blending that combines fun and enterprise. Participants enjoy and feel happy taking part in game shows as it is fun and very often, there are prizes to be won which are sponsored by an enterprise, be it a company or business. While it is asserted that Hinglish items like funterprise typically occur in informal situations, they do nevertheless get used, in the present situation, in a formal text among words typically found in Group A, among them its collocate epitomises and the next clause which involves ‘adagios of suspense’ and ‘crescendos of success’ for stylistic reasons. It could have been a deliberate attempt by the writer to catch the reader’s attention by focussing on the overarching funterprise which leads to the intense mood that culminates in the process and the exhilaration of winning (which utilises musical terms in a bid to signify the tempo of the atmosphere).

Group E: Words or hybrids of non-English origin used in informal situations

Figure 10: Concordance listing for goonda (from The Times of India online)

The concordance listing for a word such as goonda confirms the idea that words in the Indian context can be graded and the existence of terms that occur largely in the informal, spoken contexts. A word like goonda (which means a ruffian) was borrowed from the indigenous languages such as Hindi and Bengali. Goonda is very interesting because while most would agree that words used in the informal contexts do not conform to standard English grammar, my informants say that it is common to hear of goondaism, a morphological process of forming the noun goondaism from the noun goonda. Also, according to The Oxford Companion to the English Language, goonda can also take part in a hybridisation process – for example ‘a goonda ordinance’ (an ordinance against goondas). The semantic prosody is reflective of society’s attitudes towards the goonda, which is often one of disapproval.

Anger karna Sami.

Love karna Sami.

Marriage karna

Pity karna Sami.

Worry karna Sami.

Figure 11: Concordance listing for karna (from Indian and British English)

An example of a very productive word formation hybrid is realised by the Hindi operator karna which is used in informal contexts. When karna attaches itself to other English words such as ‘anger’ or ‘love’ which means ‘to…’, Hinglization takes place. Karna is able to collocate with most verbs, especially with emotive nouns to the left. For example, ‘love karna Sami’ translates into ‘to love Sami’ and ‘marriage karna Sami’ means ‘to get married to Sami’.

CONCLUSION

From the examination of words gleaned from corpus evidence, it is clear that a diglossic situation exists in India, where Indian English represents the H variety and is used in formal situations whereas Hinglish, the L variety is reserved for use in informal situations. In fact, the L variety seems to be growing from strength to strength as scholars observe that Indian youths have adopted Hinglish as their official language and are using it as a statement of their individuality; and as a tool for binding cum bonding. Also, we cannot forget the market forces such as MTV (which has successfully made inroads into India) popularising the use of Hinglish. If one buys Saraf’s argument, ‘Hinglish may be considered as a restructuring of the relationship of power and a passage from marginalisation through language to linguistic empowerment’ (Saraf).

There is no doubt the concentric circles model demonstrates that words used in the Indian context can be graded and divided into different groups. But Ooi himself acknowledges ‘the inadequacy of mere labelling in determining whether a certain lexical or grammatical item is an exclusive feature of a particular group of words or variety’ (Ooi 2000). After all, if a word occurs very frequently in a formal genre like a newspaper, chances are that it is likely to be used in a formal situation. But this need not always be true. It could have been used simply to invoke the familiarity or for stylistic reasons (eg. to bring attention to a particular problem such as goondaism or a phenomenon like funterprise). In addition, one cannot disregard the considerable number of Hindi, Sanskrit or Urdu words that have been codified in Western dictionaries. Examples are sari, pundit, crore, guru and roti. In the concentric circles model, they would be considered Group A words.

While one cannot disregard the usefulness of the concentric circles model as a tool, one must also be willing to be critical about it. When we examine corpus evidence, we are actually looking at language use from a synchronic perspective. A study of the same word usage ten or twenty years ago could reveal enormous differences. This is especially true in the case of Bollywood which can now be used in both the formal and informal contexts owing to the flourishing cum gradual maturity of India’s film industry, leading to its acceptance in formal contexts. Very often, linguistic changes are closely tied to societal changes. After all, there is a bi-directional relationship between language and society. The language used should reflect societal norms and similarly, societal norms construe and determine language use.

One envisages that an increasingly more self-confident India will assert her linguistic heritage with regard to her ten indigenous languages and hundreds of dialects. Both Indian English and Hinglish imply a way of life, but more importantly, an Indian way of life to be used internationally and intranationally.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my two informants – Dr. Gyanesh Kudaisya and Dr. SP Thinnappan, lecturers from the Department of South Asian Studies for assisting me in this paper. Their academic perspective is greatly appreciated.

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THE NOTION OF IMPERMANENCE

One of the most salient teachings of Zen Buddhism is the notion of impermanence. Life is transient because nothing lasts forever. This is reflected in the famous rock gardens in Ryoanji Temple in Kyoto. The rock gardens have been there for centuries, without any change in design. The garden is permanent, yet the viewer is impermanent. This is a paradoxical hint at the impermanence of human beings. Ironically, even the rocks are not permanent, as they are covered with moss or get weathered away after thousands of years. Also, the trees in the garden change colour during the four seasons. In spring, the freshness of green beckons. Summer heralds the multiplicity of even greener leaves. This is in stark contrast in autumn when most leaves turn to red. In winter, snow falls and covers the entire place.

Similarly, the Japanese prize a tea bowl that has been cracked and mended more highly than a brand new one. Perhaps, it attempts to call attention to the cracks, suggesting the long chain of people who have held it in their hands. This certainly is more human than a recently made bowl. Yet this work of art is made of nothing more extraordinary than humble clay.

CONCENTRATION IN HERE AND NOW

Secondly, Zen teaches one the art of concentration in here and now. The maintenance of focus in one’s life is important, the present moment being especially so. There need not be any illusion about the past not the future as this is an unnecessary worriment. The practicality of Zen Buddhism was especially useful to the samurais as it helped them to be better prepared in their fighting. One cannot fight well unless he focuses his concentration deeply on every moment. The practice of meditation gave the warrior greater control of his weapon and more importantly, emphasises the unimportance of death. And the warrior who is ready to die is a formidable opponent. The Japanese landscape gardens, with its simple design is the most suitable place for the samurais to meditate, focusing on here and now.

In the tea ceremony, once one steps into the tea room, every action taken is an art of concentration. In the sacred space, the visitor sits motionlessly, watching in silence the course of the smoke from the incense. He is certain to hear the cries of a bird flying by or the dripping of the water or the rustle of the wing. Because these sounds are so fleeting, so transitory, the presence of silence is felt all the more profoundly. A moment has communion with eternity when sound meets silence to create music. In the actual preparation of tea, the host must pay special attention to four things – the fire, the water, the spoon and the bamboo whisk. The spoon to measure the powdered tea and the whisk to stir it, requiring delicacy and care in order to ensure a perfect balance. By engaging in such activities, the Japanese improve themselves, emphasising the overlapping of both secular and religious practices.

TRUTH VIA NATURE

Thirdly, as Zen is a practical religion, the focus is not on the abstract or metaphysical. One meditates and expresses the truth via nature and natural objects, for example via the beauty of rocks, trees and mountains. The Japanese extol harmony with nature, yet they bring it down to their own level by miniaturising it in boxed gardens, bonsai and dry landscape gardens. The essence of Japanese naturalism seems to lie in an appreciation of the interaction and affinity between humans and nature. For instance, the fifteen stones of the Ryoanji Temple, irregular in shape and position allows us to participate in the creation of the garden and may move us even more. In sum, nature stirs our imagination.

SIMPLICITY

Fourthly, one is able to detect the idea of simplicity in the art forms. In Zen, meditation is a way of self-understanding. Every man has a Buddha-nature and to realise it, he need only look within himself. This subdued taste is reflected in the tea ceremony, where qualities of wabi and sabi are highly valued. The taste for the rustic can be explained by the preference for a rusty-looking kettle as opposed to a gleaming new one. Tea utensils are not made of exquisite porcelain but of coarse pottery, often a dull brown or black and imperfectly formed. One will also be surprised at the simplicity found in the tea room itself. The tea room is spartan, consisting of only the tatami mats, the tea utensils and the incense. In some tea rooms, a vase with a solitary stalk of flower and a black-ink scroll painting can also be round. But these are optional. When one participates in the tea ceremony proper, one must also be dressed in a simple, subdued designed kimono to blend in with the simple ambience.

Similarly, the notion of simplicity is witnessed in the Japanese landscape garden. In a Japanese dry landscape garden, one only sees a few rocks and white gravel substituting for water. It is a simple design. Yet in order to produce this supposed simplicity, one needs to employ complex ideas and there is enormous human manipulation involved behind it. Because the rocks are the backbone of the entire garden, every choice one makes of the arrangements and positions is vital. This also includes the colour of the wall behind the landscape. Again, owing to the fact that the landscape is so white, what kind of clay should one use?

THE IMPORTANCE OF SELFLESSNESS

Lastly, Zen teaches one to overcome one’s individual desires. Buddhahood cannot be sought after or obtained for oneself; but only for its own sake. The preoccupation with zazen, “sitting in mediation” emphasises the importance of selflessness, without any thought of achieving an end apart from the means. The selflessness of the elements in the tea garden are a testimony to this. The stepping stones, the stone basin and the stone lantern each silently teaches its lesson in selflessness. The flag-stones are willing to remain below to be stepped on. The water basin, where every visitor washes himself before entering the tea hut may awaken the thought that the cleansing of the hands is made possible only by the willingness of the water to take away the dirt, the second example of selflessness. Interestingly, the use of the dipper to purify oneself before the tea ceremony bears an uncanny resemblance between the indigenous Shinto tradition (where ritual purification with the help of the water contained in the dipper before one enters the Shinto shrines gives purity to body and soul) and the tea ceremony. Lastly, there is a stone lantern which sheds a pale light. A little thought may lead to the realisation of the wick, which is willing to be consumed in flame in order to illuminate, however faintly, a dark corner of the tea garden.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, by participating in both the tea ceremony and the Japanese landscape garden design, one has unknowingly been put on an eye-opening journey into the world of Japanese aesthetics, a journey which also includes the embedded influence of religion.

DEATH: A NECESSARY RITUAL

“Life strategies are intimately connected with the past, the past as an ordered succession of generations, as well as an ordered interpretation of death within the household.” (Hamabata, p.57) As such, it comes as no surprise that the Japanese have a deep respect for rituals which form an important aspect of life. Without rituals, life becomes meaningless for the individual. Through rituals, self-consciousness is awakened and helps make the connection with both the past (rituals for one’s ancestors) and the future (making sure one’s descendent will repeat the same rituals for oneself). This is vital because this process aids the Japanese to reflect on their present lives.

This is especially true as this process of reflection during obon (Festival of the Dead) “serves as a medium for heightening the experiences of self-understanding.” (Hamabata, p.56) The Japanese turn to Buddhism to give meaning to death. On the evening of Jul 13 (in Tokyo) or Aug 13 (for regions outside Tokyo), living members of the household walk to the temple graveyard to welcome home the dead. At the household tomb, the spirits are greeted and guided home with simple paper lanterns. At home, the flame from the lantern is then transferred to a candle on a specially constructed obon altar. On Jul 16 (in Tokyo) or Aug 16 (for regions outside Tokyo), the flame is transferred back to the lantern and the dead walked back to the household tomb, where they return to the spirit world.

Household members are solely responsible for maintaining the realm of the sacred during obon, as they set up the altar, make offerings of food and prayer and secure the presence of a priest to chant sutras. The items found on the obon altar themselves seek to remind one of the high value accorded to the concept of purity. The incense, which is a necessity is for okiyome (purification), just as the water in the lotus-leaf bowl is sprinkled with the bush clover on the 108 pieces of eggplant to cleanse life of the 108 sins of mankind. In some altars, the cucumber with four toothpicks stuck in it is in fact a horse, just as the eggplant is an ox. According to Japanese mythology, they provided a mode of transportation for the ancestors on their long journey from and back to the spirit world.

It must be emphasized that although obon is an important event, it is only a part of a whole ritual cycle that revolves around caring for the dead. As this suggests, death does not represent the final stage of the Japanese life cycle. It only marks the beginning.

According to Plath, there are three categories of souls in the Japanese household religion, namely the departed, the ancestors and the outsiders. The departed (shiryoo) is the soul of the newly deceased. On the other hand, the ancestors (senzo) are all the departed regular members of the household who have been expunged from living memory. In sharp contrast to both shiryoo and senzo, the outsiders (muenbotoke) comprise “all homeless souls who are not regularly affiliated with any household.” (Plath, p.304)

However, in my opinion, Plath’s categorization for the muenbotoke is rather narrow and should be broadened to include the spirits who commit suicide or who died as an unmarried adult. The Japanese regard death as a natural dying process of a permanent member in the ie. By committing suicide, one has in fact chosen death over life when he can still live on. Similarly, when one fails to establish the family line and continue it for his descendents by procreation, he is cut off from the ie. Hence, in Japan where the concept of the ie is very strong, these two additional categories can be justified to be relegated to the class of muenbotoke.

Interestingly, the Japanese conceptualization of death has a dual function of both remembering and forgetting. Transforming the dead is the work of transforming the living and it starts at the funeral, the forty-ninth day, first obon and culminates in ancesterhood. All these are intended to cleanse the shiryoo of the pollution of death. Often referred to as nii-botoke (new-buddha) until sent away with all the other ancestors at the end of the first obon, the shiryoo retains some of the contamination of death that must be ritually cleansed.

Hamabata remarks that until “members of the household have aided in separating the shiryoo from direct involvement with life, it remains a source of danger for the living.” (Hamabata, p.59) This is because the spirit of the shiryoo remains a threat to the living, at least until the first obon following death. Until the shiryoo is removed from worldly concerns, there is a fear of curses by the shiryoo that may be incurred if he is thought to have been maligned in life. Thus, this implies that the dead must be appeased by the living members of the ie.

The dead are remembered through ancestor worship as the Japanese find themselves most deeply and directly affected through their dead kinsman. As a Japanese ie consists of both the living and the dead, both are essential to its existence. The living actively maintains the family line while the dead serve mainly as moral arbiters and as sources of emotional security which ensures the maintenance of household ties. For example, when the Japanese achieve something, they would inform the ancestors and offer incense at the butsudan (ancestral altar). This is perhaps why even cabinet members today visit the Ise Shrine to give thanks after being appointed positions in the cabinet. Also, if they have done something to shame the family, they would be reprimanded in front of the butsudan and made to feel ashamed of his own actions. The shelf is associated with the ie and with society in general. Rebelling before it is tantamount to rebelling against the whole world. The late Showa emperor was said to have visited Ise Shrine and reported the reasons for Japan’s defeat during World War II to Amateratsu, the Sun Goddess whom the Imperial family is believed to have been descended from.

During the first forty-nine days after a death, when the status of the departed’s soul changes from shiryoo to nii-botoke, the living members of the ie also participate in this transition by transforming their relationship to him from one with the living to one with the dead.

Whether death represents the final stage of the Japanese life cycle is dependent on the living members’ belief. As argued earlier, I am of the opinion that death is but a means to an end (ancesterhood), and cannot be regarded as the final stage. To visualize the deceased’s existence, one uses photographs and/or ancestral tablets kept inside the butsudan. This is where the memory of the ancestors is preserved. Gifts received by the house are often presented to the ancestors before they are opened, or placed inside the altar after the wrapping has been removed. Visiting members of the house have also been observed to have walked right past their living relatives to greet the ancestors before they acknowledge the human beings present. A married daughter might even ask permission from the household head of her natal family to allow her to make copies of her deceased parents’ memorial tablets and place these copies in the butsudan of her new household. This is done so that she can continue to remember her dead parents and seek emotional comfort.

TRANSFORMING THE DEAD

Obon and other memorial rites are part of a gradual ordered process of forgetting, whereby the deceased moves in gradual stages from the status of shiryoo to ancesterhood (senzo), as they are expunged from the memories of the living. This ordered process of forgetting takes the dead through a series of status transformation – from shiryoo to nii-botoke (new buddhas); from nii-botoke to hotoke (buddhas); from hotoke to senzo. This process of transforming the dead from shiryoo to senzo means that at some point in time, the living will let go finally and forget the dead, without any sense of guilt.

One important point to note is that not everyone gets to proceed on to ancesterhood. Because there are only two permanent positions – household head and household wife in an ie, the path to ancesterhood is restricted. The attainment of ancesterhood is determined by the attainment of a permanent position within an ie. Thus, it is clear that while some shiryoo will eventually become senzo, muenbotoke can never attain ancesterhood.

The rites performed by members of the ie to facilitate status transitions in the realm of the dead, from shiryoo to senzo, may be classified into two categories: the personal and the ancestral. Although the personal and the ancestral often overlap, seasonal rites tend to be weighted towards the ancestral, and the daily, monthly cum yearly rites towards the personal. The first obon is especially important in the personal cycle of attaining ancesterhood. Subsequent obon would be less important in the personal cycle. As the deceased makes his way into ancesterhood, the personal rites take on less significance and the ancestral rites, which are seasonal, take on greater significance. Thus in the personal cycle, the important dates are the forty-ninth day after death, the hundredth day, the first year, the third year, the seventh year, the thirteen year, the twenty-third and the final thirty-third or fiftieth anniversary of death. The seasonal rites are observed during the equinoxes and obon.

The ie members experience two periods of intense pressure, namely the time until the forty-ninth day and during the first obon. While the former is marked by a state of uncertainty and uneasiness as in the possible curses upon the living, the latter is one of joy as the deceased, who is now already a nii-botoke (after the forty-ninth day) will be on his way to becoming a hotoke in time to come. In addition, this also marks a time when the deceased will be finally sent off to the spirit world, when it is finally separated from direct involvement in the world of the living.

Many Japanese regard the thirty-third anniversary of death as the official transition point into ancesterhood. However, no one is quite sure when exactly the hotoke becomes a senzo. It could occur years before or after that date. It depends on the process of forgetting. In Machida’s words, “as long as death is seen from the viewpoint of life, memorial services such as ancestral worship are deemed important, but when life is seen from the viewpoint of death, such religious rituals begin to appear secondary.” (Machida, p.151) We can further interpret this as from the departed’s point of view, to be completely forgotten is in fact a blessing, as it means being allowed the path to a sacred existence as an ancestor. If so, then “according to Shinto, death would make the deceased into one of the gods, kami, who is to be respected and kept at a distance.” (Pinguet, p.52)

As the days, months and years pass after the day of the death, the living slowly but gradually let go of the dead and the dead begin to play a less significant role in the lives of the living. But until that happens, the dead and their memorial tablet do more than simply provide comfort for the living while they adjust to life without their loved ones.

Death situations can also be politically charged. The death of a family member becomes the venue where family hostility could be acted out, especially in a large extended family, where each member is eager to confirm his honke (main family) status and relegate the others to the bunke (branch family). Thus, whoever takes charge of the funeral preparations is seen as the one vested with power and authority in the ie and is certainly almost assured of the honke status.

It is perhaps ironic that death, not only in Japan, is transformed into a scene of mockery. Consider this scenario. The priest of a certain Buddhist temple has been engaged to direct the death ritual. He is the one who sets the mood and tone. He prescribes an atmosphere of elegance, with the sweet smell of flowers (not necessarily frangipanis, the flower of dead), the deep soothing sound of the sutras intoned and the heavenly veil of smoking incense. Everything seems strangely beautiful and mystifying. The bereaved forgets his own sorrow and is seen busy entertaining his friends or colleagues who come to this ‘gathering’ and are treated to a vegetarian dinner, light snacks like nuts or melon seeds and drinks in return for a nominal ‘fee’. In Singapore (at least), death funerals also double up as mahjong hot-spots where easy money can be made within a very short time. In short, my idea is that the bereaved becomes a directed actor in a play and there is someone giving him instructions on how to act and behave. Death is now seen as a lucrative business with high tangible profits as activities such as those described above have commercialized death and fees vary from a bland, simple event to a grand, pompous ceremony staged to show off the wealth of the household. As such, death no longer remains a private affair.

Japanese obsession with the notion of death is re-enacted on the stage, most promptly showcased by the Noh theatre. Zeami, Noh’s founding father, had always been intrigued by ghosts – ghosts seen, ghosts half-seen, ghosts seen in a dream between waking and sleeping. These have been common themes dominating Noh plays since the beginnings of the Noh theatre and they look set to continue into the future because as far as the Japanese are concerned, both the living and the ghosts of the dead co-exist; and via such plays, their understanding of the dead and their ghosts is heightened.

Perhaps why death does not and will not represent the final stage in the Japanese life cycle is because the Japanese choose to memorialize the individual after death. Having done this, the existence of the deceased is recognized and respected though the deceased is no longer with the living. Memorializing the dead goes through a progressive stage whereby the dead is remembered on closer time frequency to an occasional remembrance up to a point when they are completely forgotten by their descendents who have lost track as to who their ancestors are. The Japanese conceptualization of death is a slow but gradual process of forgetting the dead and coming to terms with the lost of a loved one. Nevertheless, by being able to deal with the inevitability of death and accepting it, we unconsciously become better persons. 

Bibliography

Hamabata, Matthews Masayuki. Crested Kimono: Power and Love in the Japanese Business Family. New York: Cornell University Press, 1990.

Machida, Soho. Renegade Monk. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999.

Pinguet, Maurice. Voluntary Death in Japan. Cambridge: Polity Press, 1993.

Plath, David W. “Where the Family of God is the Family: The Role of the Dead in Japanese Households.” in American Anthropologist, Vol. 66, Part 1. Washington, 1964. 

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

Of particular interest to this paper will be a discussion of the Japanese community in Singapore and via an in-depth study of the Japanese Services Department in the Metropolitan Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) Singapore, hopefully be able to shed some light on whether the negatively laden labels applied to the Japanese such as “exclusiveness”, “aloofness”, “withdrawn”, “failure to localize” and “discriminating” are valid.

THE BEGINNINGS OF THE METROPOLITAN YMCA

Sir George Williams founded the YMCA in London in 1844 with the objective to develop a humanistic society via the youths. The symbol of the YMCA is an inverted triangle that represents the spirit, mind and body which are to be developed simultaneously to achieve equilibrium. This movement mushroomed and in the span of 150 years has given rise to 106 branches all over the world, thus being known as the Metropolitan YMCA to reflect its global, all religions and inter-racial standing cum commitment.

THE METROPOLITAN YMCA SINGAPORE

The seed of the Chinese YMCA in Singapore was sown on 25 Nov 1945 soon after the Japanese surrender. After World War II, social recreation constituted gambling and other forms of vice. Dr. Chen Su Lan, a member of the British Administrative Council, saw that a majority of the youths who were Chinese-speaking were without moral direction, or avenue for meaningful recreation.
The Chinese YMCA was inaugurated in Singapore in 1946 together with leaders from various churches. Despite facing problems such as rivalry with the Orchard Road YMCA which catered strictly to the English-speaking, lack of facilities and manpower, the Chinese YMCA flourished remarkably under the perseverance of the pioneering batch under Dr. Chen. In 1974, the Chinese YMCA changed its name to the Metropolitan YMCA Singapore, in line with the Association’s changing constitutional needs. Its wide range of activities encompass physical education (which includes the Japanese Services Department), enrichment, child care centres and hostel services.

ENCOUNTERS WITH THE JAPANESE COMMUNITY IN SINGAPORE

As compared to the prewar Japanese community which was an immigrant community comprising mostly of the Japanese prostitutes (karayukisan) who were deemed the social outcasts, the postwar Japanese community is largely made up of young middle ranking businessmen and managers who have been sent to Singapore on an overseas posting. Most of them come on a three to four year stint and if the company provides special allowances for their family, they will bring their wives and children along.

The wives of these Japanese businessmen are usually housewives. Most do not work for two reasons. First, it is the expected social norm in Japan for women to quit their jobs when they get married or are pregnant, in order to re-focus their energies and time on looking after the family and children. In addition, owing to the fact that the companies give special allowances to the spouses, these Japanese wives are entrusted with the task of serving their husbands and catering to their needs.

It is the commonly held perception that the Japanese tend to be a very exclusive community as they choose to mix only with other Japanese, thus exhibiting a passive redrawal from Singapore society. The case study below is an attempt to determine the extent to which this comment is valid.

THE JAPANESE SERVICES DEPARTMENT AND ITS ACTIVITIES

The Metropolitan YMCA Singapore established the Japanese Services Department in 1980 in view of the increasing number of Japanese living in Singapore. Its dual aims are to create an avenue for the Japanese to interact with the locals and to allow them to be familiar with life in Singapore. This can alleviate their stress levels, provide activities for their children and give advice during the child’s developmental stage. All these will hopefully be achieved through the group activities and sports planned for them. The ultimate aim is for the child to enjoy play, yet imbibe the ideals of group living (shudan seikatsu) and the workings of it. Group life is to be fostered not as regimented and restrictive, but as a happy time of playing and sharing for the children. This is evident as most activities organized are group activities, such as soccer, baseball and outdoor activities like camping, although solo activities like swimming and PE are immensely popular too. Soccer is the most popular among the children.

THREE MAIN GROUPS OF PARTICIPANTS

My male informant remarked that all these activities could only find participants from three groups – the children, who form the bulk of the participants, the housewives in their 30s to 50s (who make up the second largest group) and a small percentage of younger generation of Japanese women, mostly single and in their late 20s or early 30s. The male group, characterized by the businessmen was nonexistent. Three reasons could be given to account for this observation. Firstly, all activities during term time were conducted in the afternoons (the children would come in straight after school) and the latest activity ended at 6:30pm. This is in line with our understanding that since the Japanese businessmen do lots of overtime, they will still probably be cooped up in the office at this hour. Or, many would be at the karaoke lounges, pubs or night golf courses busy entertaining and socializing with clients. Social interaction within the Japanese group is intense.

Second, even if they had the time to participate, many still preferred to participate in the activities organized by the Japanese Association. This would have provided another opportunity for businessmen alike to rub shoulders and discuss potential contract deals while participating in the activities. After all, not all the Japanese residing in Singapore could afford to join the Japanese Association as members. The Japanese Association, though in name was for all Japanese residents, in practice proved to be a high and exclusive place only for the rich Japanese. Compared to the exorbitant entrance fees charged by the Japanese Association for both its corporate and ordinary members which are $3,000 – $10,000 and $1,000 respectively which helped maintain its status, the fees set by the Japanese Services Department are very affordable indeed. Entrance fees for adult and child are $30 and $10 respectively. Membership lapses after one year and renewal fees are pegged at $60 and $20 respectively. In order to participate in any activity, one has to become a member first. It was also a surprise when I learnt that the fees charged by the Japanese Services Department were three times cheaper than those charged back in Japan (Tokyo or Osaka), thus even making it worthwhile for the Japanese housewives and children to join more activities during their stay in Singapore.

Thirdly, the primary agent of socialization in Japanese society is between the mother and child. We hear of terms such as “kyoiku mama”, “mother fixation”, “mazakon” and most importantly the close physical contact between mother and child (skinship) and the emphasis on ittaikan. Of special mention is a particular category of activity labelled “PE for mother and child”. This fully illustrates the close amae situation between mother and child and will aid in the overall socialization process. The image of the father is almost nonexistent, leading scholars to label Japanese society as a “fatherless society”. The children hardly get to see their fathers who come home very late from their night entertainment or are posted away from their hometown (as in the case of Japan). As such, the father is like a shadow to most children – someone whom they know exist but they hardly get to see.

FUNCTIONING OF THE ACTIVITIES

The current number of members under the Japanese Services Department stands at around 650. Two Japanese instructors on special assignment (two-year assignment) from Osaka YMCA and Yokohama YMCA respectively are in charge of the wide range of twenty-eight physical education programmes and outdoor activities. Despite the enthusiasm showed by some of the Singaporean volunteers, the criteria remains for a native Japanese to be sent over to take up the post of instructor. Manpower is lacking but both my informants are not complaining. They told me that many Japanese housewives and high school students have come forward as volunteers for activities. This is especially common during the spring and summer holidays when special programmes such as soccer competitions, island hopping trips to Pulau Tioman and camps are organized. The camps being divided into the normal camp (lasting two days and one night) and the adventure camp (lasting four days and three nights), are immensely popular during the holidays. They have been initiated as a means of getting the Japanese children to explore the different parts of Singapore and to come into contact with nature. The maximum number of students allowed at each camp is thirty-five, not including the six Japanese volunteers.

From Chart 1, it can been seen that the activities of Japanese Services Department, are second only to the aquatics sports in terms of overall programme participation of YMCA Singapore. From the list of activities, I noted a distinct two-way division. Each activity, for example swimming would have classes for the kids and the youth. Kids are taken to mean children from the age of three to five years old. Youth stands for children of primary school-going age, from six to eleven years old. Activities for the housewives and single Japanese women include swimming and aerobics, which is the all time favourite.

Chart 1: YMCA Singapore Programme Participation
 
Breakdown

The housewives and children do promotion and publicity works for the various activities via word of mouth or simple “salesman recommendation technique” as my female informant puts it. As each activity comprises of at least three levels to cater to the different age groups, for example a four year old may after having gone through the PE class for three to four years old proceed to join the next class for five to eight years old, under the strong recommendation of the instructor (see Table 1).

Table 1: Programme Sheet of PE for Kids (translated)

A LEARNING EXPERIENCE

Both my informants emphasized many times during the course of the interview that all activities were not restricted solely to the Japanese. However, Japanese still dominate or even monopolize strongly. I was told that in any one class, not more than four Singaporeans take part in the activities. In a class of about thirty-five participants, one would be happy to find two or three Singaporeans. The main drawback was pinpointed to the fact that Singaporeans could join but they must be able to converse smoothly in Japanese. If they are not able to meet this first and only prerequisite, they will be barred from joining for fear of not understanding the instructions of the Japanese instructor. This is strong evidence to show that language and cultural differences remain a difficult barrier to overcome. With this existing obstacle, it is very difficult to encourage more Singaporeans to participate in the activities, alongside with the Japanese.

The minute number of Singaporeans who participated in the activities did enjoy themselves and established good friendships with their Japanese classmates. Most joined together with their Japanese friends. I was brought to note the fact that contrary to their husbands’ aloofness and strong discrimination towards women, (Singaporean women included even though sexual equality is more balanced here than in Japan) the Japanese housewives and especially the younger women were all very eager to get acculturated or assimilated into Singapore society, and that meant getting to know more about Singapore through their Singaporean classmate(s); not forgetting the opportunity to use a little English mixed into their sentences.

There has been much criticism that the Japanese do not socialize outside their community to make new friends. This would definitely impede the establishment of deeper contacts. Returning to the issue on language difference, I feel strongly that most Singaporeans would not bother to take up Japanese language just to be able to converse with the Japanese. English is and remains Singapore’s language of trade, commerce, law, government and education – the important pillars supporting any economy with the rest of the world. Similarly, the Japanese language performs these same functions for Japan. There is no doubt speaking Japanese and being Japanese retains prestigious status in the life of every Japanese. Even though all Japanese have learnt English during their schooling years, most Japanese still prefer to converse in their native tongue.

CONTINUATION TO AND FROM THE JAPANESE SERVICES

The international Metropolitan YMCA network of branches is complex and intertwining. Short-term foreign exchange programmes have been initiated with Tokyo YMCA and Osaka YMCA, though the frequency is not high owing to the lack of manpower. But what is amazing is that the Japanese housewives and children were already members of their respective city’s YMCA organization and had been participating actively in the activities before they resided in Singapore. And when they return home, they will continue this link with the YMCA.

NO LOCALIZATION

Despite being based in Singapore, the Japanese Services Department adheres very closely with the Japanese system. This seeks to remind one of the numerous complaints one hears about Japanese companies located in Singapore trying to do things the Japanese way and still having a Japanese manager in control of the locals. For instance, activities for both kids and youths correspond to the Japanese school system. All activities start in April and end in the following March. There is a total of three terms with each term lasting for four months. This is done so as to allow the children to re-fit into the Japanese school system effortlessly when they return to Japan. What is more remarkable is that the Japanese Services Department follows the public holidays of Japan. The only exception is that the department observes a one-week holiday during the Chinese Lunar New Year period. The membership application form, guidelines and all programme brochures are also in Japanese.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS OF THE JAPANESE SERVICES DEPARTMENT

When questioned about the future directions of the Japanese Services Department, both my informants envisaged great ambitions. As most of the activities are centred around the children presently, they see a possibility of creating more activities to involve the adults and perhaps the whole family. They also wished for more overseas camps, more facilities and to maintain constant upgrading of the present equipment. On the list was also the hope to see more Singaporeans participating in the activities.

However, four reasons still exist which may not make the last wish come true. Firstly, allowing only Singaporeans who can speak good Japanese to join the activities has subconsciously filtered out the other interested Singaporeans who fail to meet this prerequisite. Although the instructors mean well, most Singaporeans would find it hard to meet this requirement as they do not speak the Japanese language. Conversely, getting a Singaporean instructor to conduct the class would also not solve the problem, as the majority of participants are still the Japanese. This is closely related to the issues on cultural and language differences.

Secondly, the timings of the activities are not flexible. The Japanese Services Department schedules all its activities in the afternoons. This will again rule out the Singaporean women (as more Singaporean women work as compared to Japanese women) and the children (who attend school or are preoccupied with their ECAs, class remedials and other projects).

Thirdly, a quick check with the personnel staff of YMCA Singapore has revealed that most Singaporean participants are not aware that a Japanese Services Department actually exists, let alone know of what it offers.

Lastly, Singaporeans can find other alternative sources. All activities that are organized by the different departments of YMCA Singapore can also be found at schools in the form of ECAs, community centres, churches and other social organizations. These places are in fact cheaper and more accessible to the prospective participant.

WHITHER THE JAPANESE COMMUNITY IN SINGAPORE?

Sad to say, although the Japanese remain one of Singapore’s largest expatriate communities, they have also been the least acculturated into Singapore society. Inability to speak the local languages and unfamiliarity with prevailing local customs cum mannerisms have hampered social interaction between them and the dominant society. While the labels with negative connotations are used to describe the Japanese, it is not fair to say that all Japanese behave in the same stereotyped patterns. There are exceptions and this trend is becoming more obvious as increasingly more begin to buck the system and question its values and applicability in an ever-changing world. This is also evident in the case study of the Japanese Services Department.

The most striking development in the 1980s and 1990s was the emergence of a new generation of Japanese residents in Singapore who are not businessmen working in Japanese companies. This new generation of Japanese include a wider spectrum such as Japanese females married to Singaporeans, professionals, Japanese students coming to Singapore to learn Mandarin, Japanese language teachers, singles, artists etc. Many are young and single (mostly in their mid 20s and 30s) and have come on their own accord. They are much more interested in learning the local culture and befriending Singaporeans, as we have seen.

In conclusion, while Japanese businessmen are real life testimonies of the negative labels, there is still much hope abound in the new generation of Japanese who have come and the Japanese housewives who participate in the swimming and aerobics classes organized by the Japanese Services Department. They have taken the initiative to socialize with Singaporeans and are indeed the true pioneers of internationalization. Although they constitute only about 5-10% of the total Japanese population in Singapore, this is a positive sign and perhaps is an indication of even better things to come in the near future if more Japanese of this nature settle down in Singapore.

Bibliography

Benjamin Ng, “The Japanese Association and the Kowloon Club: A Study of the Japanese Community in Singapore from a Comparative Perspective” (Senri Ethnological Studies, No. 50, forthcoming)

Kwok Pek Har, “The Japanese Community in Singapore: A Study in Social Geography”. Honours Thesis, 1977
Metropolitan YMCA Singapore 50th Anniversary 1946 – 1996

Metropolitan YMCA Singapore Annual Reports 1996, 1997 and 1998

The History of the Chinese YMCA of Singapore (1945 – 1956) (Chinese Young Men’s Christian Association, Singapore)

Special Thanks to

Mr. Shigetaka Nakahara and Ms. Megumi Nagira, my two informants from the Metropolitan YMCA Singapore Japanese Services Department for the interview.

Mr. FL Chan of the Japanese Embassy for providing me with the statistics of the number of Japanese expatriates residing in Singapore.

Ms Phyllis Tan, Assistant Executive Director of the Metropolitan YMCA Singapore for posting the Annual Reports to my house.  

There is no doubt the Japanese manufacturing industry has acquired a high international standing. But there are always two sides to every coin, and Japan’s manufacturing industry is no exception. Problems inherent in the system have surfaced gradually in the last ten years and threaten the very existence of this engine of growth. Also, Japan is currently facing its worst economic recession in years.

Of particular interest to this paper are the future directions of Japan’s manufacturing industry and by studying an example of a successful cum well established Japanese manufacturing company, Kenwood Corporation, hopefully shed some light on this growing concern.

EVOLUTION OF THE JAPANESE MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY

Poor in natural resources, Japan had no choice but to earn its way in the world through a combination of manufacturing and trade. It took in many of the world’s technological advances as possible, absorbed them and used what emerged to produce attractive consumer products to earn foreign currency.

Two distinctive features can be found in the historical background of the Japanese manufacturing industry. One is a zigzag pattern. From the beginning, the Japanese manufacturing industry had not proceeded in the same direction nor even developed uniformly. In fact, this zigzag tendency was aided to a large extent by both historic disturbances and opportunities that arose both within and beyond Japan. Japan was especially quick to capitalize on such timings which gave her ample opportunities to penetrate the world market. This brings to mind the war years of World War I. When the Allied forces concentrated their efforts on fighting the war and thus their production levels fell drastically, Japan filled in the vacuum vacated in the industrial world and upped her manufacturing quantities to meet the increasing demand for such goods. Also, in 1973, while the first oil crisis caused a shift in the industrial structure, it also strengthened Japan’s capability to deal with challenging circumstances. Because of a congruity between government policy and management strategy, the second oil crisis did not have any effects on Japan.

Another crucial feature is the gradual development of an industrial plan. Japan has had an industrial structure corresponding to the level of development of the economy at each stage, and has furthermore flexibly and steadily altered it. While aiming for a wide encompassing industrial structure within its domain, Japan has been able to alter its industrial base and industrial presence. This is very much due to the credit of the strong governmental leadership. Financing (provision of cheap funds for rapid industrialization, mobilizing domestic savings and the Bank of Japan guaranteeing loans by city banks who provide loans to corporations), coupled with industrial policy, strong export driven growth since the 1970s and protectionistic measures have been the most commonly cited means by which the government has played a major role in shaping the fortunes of the manufacturing industry.

THE PRESENT DAY MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY

On the whole, the Japanese manufacturing industry has exhibited strong competitive power. It has maintained this power through high product quality (not simply in the sense of a physical product but also including the manufacturing industry’s adaptability to market factors in extending their range of goods and prompt delivery, among many others), high productivity at the plant sites, low production costs and value-added products.

Also, economic growth has raised the level of the average Japanese’s income. With improvements in income, the Japanese market has grown enormously and this has further benefited the Japanese manufacturing industry by creating extra demand for such goods. However, this held true only until the bursting of the bubble in March 1990.

For my purpose, I will be examining in greater detail an example of a Japanese manufacturing company with a history of 53 years, Kenwood Corporation.

PROFILE OF KENWOOD CORPORATION

Kenwood Corporation was established in December 1946 in Komagane City, Nagano Prefecture, Japan. Since its incorporation, Kenwood Corporation has stressed innovation as the means to provide customers with the best in home audio and car audio products, test and measuring instruments, and telephone and communications equipment (amateur and land mobile). Kenwood Corporation’s attention to detail in both product quality and functions has helped her become a prominent international manufacturer.

Today, Kenwood Corporation’s products are distributed in over 120 countries throughout the world, and enjoy a reputation for reliability and technological innovation.

As part of its strategic worldwide vision, Kenwood Corporation is constantly establishing more production bases overseas. Currently, there are production bases in Singapore, Malaysia, China, France and Mexico. Via such production bases, it is hoped that they will contribute to the host country’s economic development by helping train engineers and boosting the ratio of the local production content. But more importantly, I believe such a move will help reduce the cost of production, thus sharpening Kenwood’s competitive edge, reason being that labour costs in Japan are very much higher than her neighbouring countries. Shifting more of its labour-intensive production overseas will help Kenwood reduce its overall cost of production. Thus it was not surprising when I learnt that there are only 2 production plants in Japan, namely the Yokohama Plant and Hachioji Plant. Majority of the production work is being done at its overseas plants. The manufactured products are then shipped back to Japan, awaiting re-shipment to the United States and Europe which form the bulk of Kenwood’s business. These activities, together with domestic sales in Japan are coordinated by the 68 sales offices found in Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya.

In Japan, Kenwood Corporation employs 2,817 employees, of which 2,583 are male and 234 are female. When asked about this huge disparity, the staff told me that the headoffice in Japan is more involved in research and development and such jobs have to be done by males.

KENWOOD COMES TO SINGAPORE

Singapore has the distinction of being Kenwood Corporation’s first overseas production base. Capitalising on Singapore’s political stability, adequate infrastructure and relatively cheap labour cost during the late 1970s, Trio-Kenwood Singapore (pte) Ltd was born in 1979 in the Toa Payoh industrial estate. The Toa Payoh production plant provided employment for about 300 employees and the number of females who were involved in the production lines were significantly more than the male technicians. With the transfer of technological know-how from Japan, Trio-Kenwood Singapore was by then already producing both home and car audio sets.

Come 1982, a second production plant was set in the Ang Mo Kio industrial park, as the first plant could not cope with the yearly increase of orders. More production lines had to be added and expansion was inevitable. According to the staff whom I interviewed, this dual operation of the Toa Payoh and Ang Mo Kio production plants continued until 1991. The Toa Payoh production plant was then shut down, effectively bringing both operations under the same roof, which continued to produce both home and car audio sets with about 1,200 employees.

A CHANGE OF FOCUS

However, even before this was taking place, Kenwood Corporation in 1990 established Trio-Kenwood Electronics Engineering (M) Sdn. Bhd., as a production base ion Malaysia and began marketing license-free transceivers. One might question if the setting up of another overseas production base in Malaysia has any bearing on Trio-Kenwood Singapore. After all both production bases were producing entirely different products. But, the Malaysian production base proved to be a double-edged sword in time to come. In 1993, a decision by Kenwood Corporation saw the production of both home and car audio sets being shifted northwards to Malaysia, hence resulting in about 800 employees being retrenched.

Nonetheless, it was revealed that although the move broke many a rice-bowls, it was a positive stride ahead. Singapore was now thrust with the production of a higher-end product, that of producing communications equipment (in the form of handphones and walkie-talkies). This was clearly in line with the Singapore government’s emphasis on high-tech production and seemed to have advantaged Singapore. Production of both home and car audio sets were getting too costly and labour-intensive to remain in Singapore. Also in line with the change in production of products, Trio-Kenwood Singapore became Kenwood Electronics Technologies (S) Pte Ltd to reflect a new image. Today, it is proud to have been awarded the ISO 9002 in Manufacturing Quality System. As the staff pointed out, sales of locally produced communication equipment are very small. As mentioned earlier, all completed products are to be shipped back to Japan to be re-shipped to America and Europe for sales. These products are then re-shipped to Singapore for local sales, depending on the occasion. Figures could not be revealed however.

STAFF MANAGEMENT

The staff management style largely parallels that of the parent company in Japan. Though the staff acknowledges the fact that she is second in charge of the Logistics Department she laments that Japanese managers are still heading the various departments some whom are even younger and less experienced than she is. Also, she has to work doubly hard to prove herself. Though there is a separate personnel department, it is also being headed by a Japanese. But, she pointed out that it could only decide on personnel matters pertaining to the lower rungs of the plant (i.e. production line workers). All other matters with regard to management level had to channelled back to Japan for decision and actions melted down. Thus, Kenwood Electronics Technologies has still not been ‘localised’ to a large extent.

RELATIONSHIP WITH SUPPLIERS

I asked the staff to tell me about Kenwood Electronics Technologies’ relationship with her suppliers. From the interview, I learnt that Kenwood Electronics Technologies chooses to do business with Japanese companies. This is further evidence that Kenwood Electronics Technologies has not tried to adapt to the local climate. It was revealed that the parent company still belittles the Singaporean suppliers and feel that their standards are far behind the Japanese. It is indeed frustrating to hear of this, but things seem to have changed in the last two years, with one or two suppliers forging a contract with Kenwood Electronics Technologies. But this figure is still disappointingly small considering that there are more than 100 suppliers. Kenwood Electronics Technologies adopts a unique ranking system of suppliers. This system ranks the suppliers on yardsticks such as the quality of products, speedy delivery among others. If a supplier lives up to such expectations, his company is then awarded a certificate stating his strengths. The more certificates a supplier receives, the higher the chance of having the contract renewed.

Keeping in line with the emphasis on high quality and value-added products, each part such as the wire cables or connectors must be meticulously checked. Also, before qualifying to be a supplier, representatives from Kenwood Electronics Technologies will go down personally to inspect the factory and quality of the samples of the prospective supplier.

THE BURSTING OF THE BUBBLE

In the 1970s, Japan was producing machinery and was heavily involved in manufacturing. But come the 1980s, wealth was created from means of invisible business by the buying and selling of stocks and shares and land. This was very attractive then because of the quick and high returns from this method of financing. This in turn drove Japan’s economic expansion even further.

The chief manifestation of Japan’s bubble economy was the astronomical value which both land and stock prices reached before this phenomenon ran its course by 1990. The bubble created a sense of unmatched prosperity in Japan with full employment, high corporate profits and the overall wealth effect created from high asset prices.

The first signs of an impending bubble burst was in March 1990 when the Nikkei stock index plunged drastically in one single day. Soon after, the whole market came crushing down rapidly. And like a chain reaction, the commercial land values eventually fell to one-third of what they were worth during the bubble period. Residential land prices were halved leading to a loss in confidence. As many loans were based on mortgages of high-priced land during the bubble period, banks could not collect back the loans they had lent out. And the ultimate effect was that Japan plunged into an economic recession and experienced stagnation.

THE GLOOM IN JAPAN

The dire consequences of the bursting of the bubble are apparent. The Japanese economy continues to stagnate, bankruptcies rising to the highest level, the failures of several large financial institutions and the decrease ion consumer demand along with declining confidence in the Japanese economy. To make things worse, the Asian economic crises rages on, affecting areas of substantial Japanese overseas investments especially in Southeast Asia, leaving the Japanese banking system with US$600 billion in bad debts. According to the latest statistics released by the Economic Planning Agency, Japan’s economy shrank for an unprecedented fifth quarter in a row, with the GDP shrinking 0.8% in the final three months of last year.

INHERENT PROBLEMS LURKING BEHIND THE SHADOWS OF THE MANUFACTURING SYSTEM

The problems Japan of facing now are detrimental. Adding on to that, one should not forget the ghosts of the manufacturing industry have come to haunt her too.

The chief problem is not limited to the manufacturing industry alone. The various social systems that are the foundations of Japanese industrial development, and that have supported the paradigm of mass production at its very core; have begun to change significantly. These changes have affected stable employment relations based on lifetime employment, the seniority wage system, enterprise unionism, and loyalty to one’s company. All there have functioned effectively up to now in an economy that experienced expanding markets and the appearance of new niches. High income and stable employment were achieved at the expense of changes in the social system, employment relations and the social awareness of the people. It is highly evident that the young generation is becoming more individualistic and thus not content to work more than twenty hours a day like their parents or grandparents did. Also, with the current economic crisis, more middle-aged men are being retrenched or forced to retire prematurely, reducing the promise of lifetime employment into a mere myth.

Second, in the Japanese market, a great proliferation of many models and brands of the same good exist side by side and compete, and there have been some dramatic innovations to meet certain consumer needs. But all this has diminished the merit of mass production and raised per unit production costs, which in turn has lowered value added. Excessive services, another feature of the intense competition among corporations, have indirectly brought about cost increases too.

To complicate matters, the distribution system in Japan has a large influence on value formation, which puts the manufacturing industry at a disadvantage. Via the way it distributes added value, few if any improvements of productivity return to it.

ALTOGETHER BAD TIMES

The miraculous development and growth of Japan’s manufacturing industry since World War II was spearheaded by three distinct systems: the Japanese economic system, the Japanese market system and the Japanese management system. Over the last twenty to thirty years, the triple supports have motivated Japan’s manufacturers to develop diverse strengths. The manufacturing industry was able to supply the world with high quality products at low prices by honing international competitiveness while improving quality, productivity and building up technological capabilities.

However, these efforts have no longer enjoyed positive results. The Japanese manufacturing industry has managed to capture markets in the United States and Europe, but not without encountering political friction, especially with the former. Increased competitiveness produced huge trade imbalances. Not forgetting that the first element in the equation has collapsed and is in no signs of recovery, and the second and third elements are causing Japanese to rapidly lose faith in them.

Currently, yet another challenge has arisen. The cumulative effects of concerted rationalisation and attempts to increase productivity have begun to show themselves in the operations of the American manufacturing industry. Improvements are also seen in product quality. The performance of American companies is getting better gradually but surely, throwing some long shadows over the very competitiveness of Japanese manufacturers had long taken pride in.

REACTIONS OF KENWOOD CORPORATION

Kenwood Corporation’s immediate concerns are similar to the Diet’s. They include a stagnant Japanese economy as a result of slowdown of growth in private investment in plant and equipment, a decrease in personal consumption induced by uneasiness about the future of Japan’s crippled cum bad debt ridden banking system and the general public’s perception of uncertainty with regard to the future of employment and income. Nevertheless, Kenwood Corporation has noted that Japanese exports to the United States and Europe were on the rise, spurred in part by the depreciation of the yen.

In the last Annual Report ’98, it was noted that overseas sales totalled ?12,175 million, a 10.8% increase over the previous year. Also, it reported a net income of ?,680 million.

Despite bleak prospects for both Japan and the region, Kenwood Corporation is committed to improving profitability in its overseas operations and strengthen its financial position. To that end, it is making every effort to achieve greater efficiency in manufacturing and sales, reduce costs, enhance its R&D capabilities and get new operations up and coming.

THE FUTURE OF KENWOOD CORPORATION

Now Kenwood has gone a step further with innovation in the IT (information technology) sector. It has teamed up with Zen Research Inc., a multinational technology company and the coalition has entered into a manufacturing partnership designed to supply the PC market with CD-ROM drives such as the Kenwood MULTI BEAM 40X Plus Drive that offer hard drive like performance. To achieve this aim, in 1997, Kenwood technologies (USA) Inc. was established and headquartered in Cupertino, California and a manufacturing plant built in the Philippines, in order to support this set up in latest CD-ROM undertaking. Kenwood Corporation will leverage its experience and expertise in many diverse fields to help in the research and development of advanced new technologies.

Also, the setting up of yet another subsidiary in April 1998, Kenwood ID, is bent on marketing high-wave/low-wave signal based systems and data carrier products to be used in no contact ID card systems. These products are ideal for use in controlling with movement of vehicles and factory automation.

WHITHER THE JAPANESE MANUFACTRING INDUSTRY?

First, competition is the keyword in changing long-held attitudes. The issue is now for Japan’s strong manufacturing industry, which is hard pressed, to reconsider its attitude towards competition.

The Japanese manufacturing industry, with its intricate parallel and excessive competition probably cannot help but turn to constructive cooperation in some form. Expressed in another way, the whole industry must effect a balance between competition and cooperation. On the one hand, cooperation may mean unity in product standards such as leading to healthy competition rather to circumstances akin to a cartel. Coordination of basic research and development is one form of desirable cooperation.

Second, the Japanese manufacturing industry needs a dosage of creative technology. Although some creativity is entailed in improving and further developing technology itself, a far greater level of activity is now expected of industrialised Japan. Two approaches have been pointed out towards the achievement of this goal. One is the fostering of creativity among technicians and workers. The second focuses on soft technology, which includes design and computer software, something that Japan has not been inclined to recognise and invest resources into without visible results. That inadequacy has been clearly recognised and the weight is being shifted to research and development in soft technology.

Third, adaptability is characteristic of a country like Japan which developed industrially to an abnormally rapid degree ion a short span of time. It first involves positioning one’s past experiences within an international framework and that means being aware of the extent of one’s influence in the world. It has been noted that Japanese companies have generally not been responsive to either of these prerequisities. In an increasingly globalised world, Japan must learn to understand the different experiences of other countries and hopefully imbibe the good points. To achieve this, Japan must engage in an exchange of information with other countries.

Grappling with adaptability and new principles of competition in order to enact this shift and move forward with creative development indeed appears to be the direction of the Japanese manufacturing industry in the future.

I believe that Kenwood Corporation has already started moving in this positive direction and will be able to emerge more competitive in years to come.

But the most crucial task at hand is to restore the health of the ailing banking system. Whether or not Japan rides out the current economic recession depends largely on the banking system. The Japanese are cutting back drastically on consumption and this does not augur well for the manufacturing industry. True, it can still hope to depend on the American and European markets but will not the equally battered Asian economies resort to the same initiative? Only when the banks are up and running will faith be restored and the Japanese be spending more and creating more domestic business for the manufacturing industry.

But I am optimistic that once Japan recovers from her current economic recession, she will rise again like the phoenix from the ashes as her history has shown.

Bibliography

Japan Commission on Industrial Performance. Made in Japan – Revitalising Japanese Manufacturing for Economic Growth, The MIT Press: Cambridge, Massachusetts London, England, 1997.

Kenwood Corporation Annual Report 1998.

Metsuhiro, Seki. Beyond The Full-Set Industrial Structure, LCTB International Library Foundation: Japan, 1994.

The Japanese banking system has traditionally been distinguished by a high degree of specialization. There are the ordinary banks, specialized banks and the Bank of Japan. We can further sub-divide the ordinary banks into city banks, regional banks and foreign banks. The specialized banks can also be differentiated into long-term credit banks, trust banks, governmental financial institutions and specialized financial institutions. However, these differences are gradually being eroded as the barriers between banking and securities businesses are reduced. This stems from the deregulation of the banking system that took place in 1992 when the Financial System Reform Law was passed. As a result of the legislation, ordinary banks, long-term credit banks and trust banks can now engage in securities activities.

Of particular interest to this paper are two sub-categories under the ordinary banks, namely the city banks and the regional banks. After all, they are the most commonly mentioned banks when one speaks of the Japanese banking system.

CITY BANKS

There are 10 city banks in Japan and such banks are considered to be the largest and most influential group of banks in Japan, after the Bank of Japan. They are based in large cities such as Tokyo and Osaka and operate domestically on a nationwide scale through networks of branch offices. City banks have traditionally emphasized their businesses with large corporate clients, including the major industrial companies in Japan. However, in the light of deregulation and other competitive factors, many of these banks (including the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi) have increased emphasis on other markets.

REGIONAL BANKS
With some exception, the regional banks tend to be smaller in terms of total assets as compared to the city banks. There are 129 regional banks whose operations are concentrated typically in one of Japan’s 47 prefectures. Sometimes, these regional banks do extend their operations into the neighbouring prefectures. Their clients are mostly small and medium sized regional enterprises and the local public. Some of the larger regional banks do however set up representative offices overseas.
For my purpose, I will be examining in greater detail the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi (an example of a city bank) and Higo Bank (an example of a regional bank).

Following the merger of Mitsubishi Bank and the Bank of Tokyo in April 1996, the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi (BTM) became the world’s largest bank in terms of assets. The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi is Japan’s premier bank. Its domestic network comprises 350 branches, sub-branches and agencies. Overseas, the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi Group consists of more than 400 facilities located in all the major financial and commercial centres of the world. The Group offers an extensive scope of financial products and services to businesses, governments and private individuals. It provides a wide spectrum of commercial, investment and trust banking products and service not only in Japan, but also throughout its global subsidiaries.

The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi is the only Japanese financial institution to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange and its commitment to fulfilling its responsibilities as a global corporate citizen has also received positive recognition.

THE BANK OF TOKYO-MITSUBISHI IN SINGAPORE

Being a leader in project finance for infrastructure, production, commercial and leisure facilities, it is deeply involved in regional resource development. Perhaps that was the chief reason why the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi chose to set up branches throughout Asia.

The Group’s Singapore capital market operations provide a reliable foundation for the growing number of businesses looking to raise funds directly in Asian markets. In Singapore, the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi offers the following services shown in Table 1.

Table 1: The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi’s operations in Singapore

FACILITY	SERVICES
Singapore Branch	Commercial Banking
Jurong Sub-Branch	Deposit Taking
Tokyo-Mitsubishi International (Singapore) Ltd	Project Financing and Merchant Banking
BTM Futures (Singapore) Pte Ltd	Futures
Sime Diamond Leasing (Singapore) Pte Ltd	Leasing

Source: BTM Annual Report 1998

What is particularly interesting about the above table is that even in an overseas subsidiary like Singapore, the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi sees the need to be specialized as in which facility provides which service. This largely parallels the practice back in Japan.

The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi in Singapore functions like any other ordinary Singapore bank. Quite surprising, there are considerable many Singaporeans who have deposited money with the bank, alongside the Japanese expatriates (although the exact figure could not be revealed as it is a bank secret). Also, the bank makes loans to individuals and corporations of any nationality, not only to the Japanese. But the Japanese still form the bulk of its business. As is the practice of other banks, if the loan requested is quite large, a collateral is required.

THE STORY BEHIND THE MERGER

Inside information from the staff of the Singapore branch of the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi has revealed that prior to the merger, Mitsubishi Bank was actually approved by the Japanese government to form a merger with the Bank of Tokyo. Signs were apparent that the Bank of Tokyo was in bad shape and had there not been a merger, it could well have been the next bank to go bust. The Bank of Tokyo, being partially owned by the government could not possibly face another setback of seeing another collapse amid the crumbling of the banking system.

Although the two banks have merged in name, there are still many issues lying beneath that have yet to be solved. The most crucial issue in the eyes of many of the employees is the wage problem. Presently, the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi still operates a dual wage system. The employees of the former Bank of Tokyo and the Mitsubishi Bank respectively would be paid according to their old salaries. As such, there are two human resource managers looking after the pay matters. One staff from the now defunct Bank of Tokyo told me that she is unhappy about the fact that her colleague from the ex-Mitsubishi Bank is actually getting a much higher salary than her, although both are doing the same job and go by the position of senior clerk. Both had the same educational background and exactly twelve years of experience in the bank. It might just take another two or three years to achieve a flat wage rate across the board for both sets of employees. Currently, the Singapore branch is awaiting further instructions from the Japanese head office with regard to this matter because incidentally, the head office is also facing the same problem.

It was also revealed that the Mitsubishi Bank was the dominant partner in the merger. But in order to accord due respect to the Japanese government, the ‘Bank of Tokyo’ label was given first priority.

Table 2: Total Assets and Liabilities of the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi

	Year ended 31 March
	1996 (yen)	1997 (yen)	1998 (yen)
Total Assets (in billions of yen)	81,098	83,570	86,814
Total Liabilities (in billions of yen)	77,237	80,005	84,071

Source: BTM Annual Report 1998

In the Annual Report 1998, reasons such as possible credit losses, an increase in non-interest expenses, net investment securities losses, net foreign exchange losses and goodwill amortization were cited to account for the increase in total liabilities for the year ended 31 March 1998.

PROFILE OF HIGO BANK

Higo Bank is a regional bank serving its main business base of Kumamoto Prefecture in central Kyushu. It counts among its major clients major departmental stores like Tsuruya and Iwata and corporations like Nikonikodo. Besides the financial services which it provides, it is also heavily involved in a wide range of environmental and cultural activities, such as the establishment of the Foundation of the Preservation of Water Resources in the province of Higo, as well as hosting art exhibitions and sponsoring ballet performances.

HIGO BANK IN SINGAPORE

The Singapore subsidiary of Higo Bank is only a representative office with three staff, namely the Chief Representative, Assistant Chief Representative and the secretary. Higo Bank’s representative office was set up in Singapore because of its strategic location and good infrastructure. The representative office functions as an information base in Southeast Asia and transmits data cum other information back to the head office in Japan. By doing so, the representative office aids its Japanese clients in Japan who wish to invest in Southeast Asia, providing them with the necessary background information.

In addition, all requests of its Japanese clients and corporations based in Singapore are redirected back to its head office. The head office will then study the merit of each loan request separately and decide whether or not to give the loan. The chief criteria which it bases its decision on will depend on the past performance and financial status of the corporation at present.

As a representative office, it does not perform the other services one would normally expect a bank to provide. As the secretary puts it, the representative office is merely a source of information and does not have the power to make any decisions. The job of both the Chief Representative and his assistant is to ensure that the relevant information is collected and sent to Japan as and when the head office requires it. But on most occasions, their primary job is to entertain the Japanese clients with activities like golfing, drinking and karaoke.

SAYING NO TO A MERGER

It came as a surprise when I learnt that Higo Bank was asked if it would want to form a merger with Fuji Bank. After all, both belonged to the Fuyo Group. (See Table 3)

Table 3: Keiretsu (The Fuyo Group)

Source: Jordi Canals, Universal Banking (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1997), p.189, table 7.8

For a small regional bank like Higo Bank to come into a merger with a big city bank like Fuji Bank would probably boost its prestige and do it some good. But merger was there none. On both occasions when Fuji Bank initiated the merger, Higo Bank refused on grounds that Fuji Bank had too many bad debts.

Table 4: Total Assets and Liabilities of Higo Bank

Source: Higo Bank Annual Report 1997. (1998 figures not available then.)

THE GREAT LAND PRICE BOOM AND THE BUBBLE ECONOMY

Any meaningful analysis of banking in Japan must address the question of how it was that the apparent overarching supremacy enjoyed by the banking system in the 1980s degenerated into a story of near disaster by the mid 1990s.

The term ‘bubble economy’ has been widely understood to apply only to the phenomenal rise in Japanese stock and land prices during the latter part of the 1980s. It aptly describes the artificial and unsustainable rates of growth in Japan’s economy during this period and beyond which enabled Japan to become the world’s largest creditor nation. The bubble was fed by spectacular increase in stock and land values between 1986 and 1990. But the problem was because of the way in which ‘asset inflation’ helped build up a massive expansion in credit, private investment and personnel consumption.

In the 1970s, Japan was producing machinery and was heavily involved in manufacturing. But come the 1980s, wealth was created from the means of invisible business by the buying and selling of stocks and shares and land. This was very attractive then because of the quick and high returns from this method of financing. This drove Japan’s economic expansion even further.

Between 1985 and the end of 1989, the stock prices peaked and during this same period, land prices in Japan quadrupled such that the price of Tokyo equalled the real estate value of the whole of America.

This remarkable appreciation in land prices made Japanese banks feel very secure with the practice of taking collateral and the rising value of the collateral (which was land) encouraged the banks to lend out even more. Because the Japanese firms practiced debt financing, which meant that 80% of its capital came from loans from banks, it has a very high risk of not being able to repay the debt. And this was exactly what happened. The land price boom received additional zest during the bubble economy period and kept snowballing. This reinforced the widely held myth that land prices would go on increasing forever. But no doubt, the bubble economy did led to the phenomenal increase in Japan’s banking assets.

THE BURSTING OF THE BUBBLE

The chief manifestation of Japan’s bubble economy was the astronomical value which both land and stock process reached before this phenomenon ran its course by 1990. The bubble created a sense of unmatched prosperity in Japan with full employment, high corporate profits and the overall wealth effect created from high asset prices.

The first signs of an impending bubble burst was in March 1990 when the Nikkei stock index plunged drastically in one single day. Soon after, the whole market came crashing down rapidly. And like a chain reaction, the commercial land values eventually fell to one-third of what they were worth during the bubble period. Residential land prices were halved leading to a loss in confidence. As many loans were based on mortgages of high-priced land during the bubble period, banks could not collect back the loans they had lent out. And the ultimate effect was that Japan plunged into an economic recession and experienced stagnation.

THE GLOOM IN JAPAN

The dire consequences of the bursting of the bubble are apparent. The Japanese economy continues to stagnate, bankruptcies rising to the highest level, the failures of several large financial institutions and the decrease in consumer demand along with declining confidence in the Japanese economy. To make things worse, the Asian economic crisis rages on, affecting areas of substantial Japanese overseas investments especially in Southeast Asia, leaving the Japanese banking system with US$600 billion in bad debts. However, both the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi and Higo Bank have been able to write away their bad debts.

THE BIG BANG

Various proposals have been made by the Japanese government for the further deregulation of the Japanese banking system and to improve the soundness of it. In November 1996, the then Prime Minister Hashimoto announced the Japanese financial system reform, which has been nicknamed Japan’s Big Bang. The most famous output of this was the formation of bridge banks to take over the failed banks. In all, ?7 trillion was set aside by the Ministry of Finance for the bridge banks which were to bail out the ailing banks and to speed up the internal reforms.

Free, fair and global are the guiding principles of Japan’s Big Bang. Overall, the Big Bang is designed to deregulate Japan’s financial system and maintain Japan’s leading role in world markets into the next millennium.

Table 5: Japan’s Big Bang

Source: BTM Annual Report 1998

However big a bang it was, it did not come soon enough. It took the Japanese government six long years to realize that the Japanese banking system was in bad shape and something had to be done about it. To answer for his country’s financial woes, Hashimoto announced his resignation in July 1998. However, the Obuchi government has pledged to carry on with the Big Bang.

A new era in Japanese banking began on 1 April 1998 as Japan took the first significant steps into realizing its Big Bang reforms and fully integrate itself into the global financial community. A new Foreign Exchange and Trade Law took effect on the same day as part of the package.

IMPLICATIONS OF THE BIG BANG FOR BANK OF TOKYO-MITSUBISHI AND HIGO BANK

This new law paves the way for the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi to leverage the global power of the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi Group to meet the wide-ranging needs of its clients around the world. The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi is responding with continued product innovations backed by timely delivery of the most advanced foreign exchange and related information.

Among the many areas evolving from the Big Bang, the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi sees foreign exchange, asset management and investment banking as strategic areas of focus.

As compared to the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, Higo Bank is now implementing its “medium-term management plan 1997″ which runs from April 1997 to March 2000. This is designed to respond to the Big Bang. Higo Bank aims to be the “number one bank for credibility”, combining high earning power and financial soundness with complete customer confidence.

The goals of its three-year plan are to strengthen earning power, move to a low-cost structure and to establish a risk management system.

WHITHER THE JAPANESE BANKING SYSTEM?

The Big Bang is scheduled to be completed early in the next century. Hopefully by then, Japan’s consumers will have a far greater choice of investment options for their ?,200 trillion of personal savings by that time. They will also be vested with greater knowledge of investment risks, leading to more efficient management of their financial resources.

Tokyo will then be reinvigorated as a financial centre, with access to a vast reserve of funds. The Big Bang signifies the opening up of Japan to the world for business based in global standards. More importantly, it will bring new opportunities to develop new products and new areas of business.

No matter how ambitious Big Bang sounds, the future of the Japanese banks really lie in the resolution of the bad debt problem. There are still some banks where the costs relating to bad debts are considerable. Larger banks should in most cases be able to survive as long as they are permitted to take their time in disposing of bad debts.

One way is to initiate more mergers between banks of different sizes as this is a combination of one bank rescuing another bank in trouble. By not letting the banks fail, this will aid the ailing banks tide over this difficult period. But this may also mean prolonging or even aggravating the deep-rooted problem and not rectifying it. One may even think of it as continuously throwing money into a black hole which is in fact a bottomless pit.

The other viable option is to let the banks fail rather than to bail them out. This is generally bad in the short term, considering that if such a measure were adopted, it will have an adverse effect on the Japanese banking sector. Not forgetting that at present, the economy is already at an all time low, and there is a greater chance of a total disintegration. On the contrary, such a measure will bring about positive effects in the long term as all the weaklings and parasites will be eradicated once and for all, leaving only the fundamentally strong and sound ones to survive. Also, in order to revitalize the entire Japanese economy, the government has to regenerate consumer spending.

I believe that banks like the Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi and Higo Bank which are successful in surviving this consolidation period will be able to emerge even more competitive come the completion of the Big Bang.

Qualitative rather than quantitative changes will decide whether or not the Japanese banking system can re-emerge with a new vigour once the immediate task of dealing with the bad loans are over. But what will really decide the future international competitiveness of Japanese banks is neither downsizing, nor upsizing through mergers. Rather, it depends on the ability of bank managements to adapt to a fundamentally changed reality and to play along with global financial rules.

Bibliography

Anthony Rowley, Banking in Japan – from Crisis to Consolidation (Financial Times, Financial Publishing: London, 1997)

Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi Annual Report 1998

Banking System in Japan (Federation of Bankers Associations of Japan, 1979)

Higo Bank Annual Report 1997

Jordi Canals, Universal Banking – International Comparisons and Theoretical Perspectives (Clarendon Press: Oxford, 1997)