Selamat menyambut bulan kemerdekaan kepada semua rakyat Malaysia...
Now we are celebrating our 52 of independent day. I can’t deem that time swift so hasty and times leave us without giving us a grip on every single second of the times. People, this may sound shadowy to you but then this is what I feel right now. Those who cant really see what was happening in the era of getting independent status, I guess they may grap a little of the real empaty of understanding of what is indipendent day all about compared to those who were in the epic of independent climax. For sure we may hear the same repetition of slogan “Selamat Hari Merdeka” year by year, yet we do come together to prop up the special day of Malaysia. That sounds so compassionate I guess. But what come to my mind is, I can overtly question you regarding your emotional and spirit level while you are hollering the phases “Selamat Hari Merdeka” either to yourself or to others. How ardent are you while bringing up the phases to public? or you just follow the flow as others are too busy to make the acquaintance of people here and there with the phrases? By not doing the same thing you may be classified as taboo or not being thankful to the nation? Nah, am just asking a question. Should be no harm and offend here. Forgive me if am wrong ya.
Well, am not to blame the occurrence of this tight spot especially among teenagers. Well, we are trying so hard, especially history teachers, to implement the sense of having gratitude and gratified of having such emancipation among teenagers. Most of teachers try so hard to make sure that the sense of independent day is not sheer a slogan to be shouted and celebrated by every August. Save for, it should be a reminisce and evoke with full of your heart’s content. Well, for us as a language teacher, we use language to scummy their oblivious imagery of the exact meaning about our “kemerdekaan” .
So, starting form this ideology the “nation and nationhood” comes across universities curriculum but not in schools. This may sound weird to people outside there, but we use English to make students understand the sense of nationality and the nationhood using the perspective of language.we use language to implement the sense of self identity and history appreciaton within a culture(for instance,malaysia culture).But,we are teaching history to students about the awarness of loyalty,and creating a frame of nationality,malaysia courtesy,and spreading the ideology of being a malaysian with a wide range of economy,social,politic and enviroment.well,correct me if am worng as all these are just a humble prespective of mine.
As you can see, language is a core mediator that both empowered and shaped the human brain such that 'culture' and 'identity' (as a human) was rooted in the acquisition and exercising of language skills. That seems fine as language is the primary mediator which is utilized to define and name your environment socially. So having one language as distinct from another must therefore be a primary source of one's identity.
Ok, the example is like this:-
But, of course, it can never be that simple. Dogs have one "language" and a dog from China can communicate seemlessly with another from Botswana or Chile. So groups of dogs, if we were in Animal Farm mode, are very unlikely to get into national self determination despite the fact that greyhounds are separate breed from fox terriers.(adapeted from www. eftclickblog.blogspot.com/2008/08/language-and-nationhood.html).
So for the conclusion, we do teach students to appreciate the meaning of appreciation of independent day using the “colonial language”. By using the language we give students to think into the perspective of languages- Bahasa Melayu and English by the same token throughout literature. Bear in my that, most of our powerful postcolonial writers (Muhamad Hj. Saleh, Saleh bin Joned and some few names) express their feeling and defiant emotion and voice using English (before and after “kemerdekaan) as the main medium which can be heard by colonizers and decolonizes. Meaning that,both colonials and decolonials can be able to acess each other mind using the english regarding the unspoken voices of decolonials easily.It was because most people (decolonizes) were educated in English medium. Bahasa Melayu comes as the national language after the independent day in order to bring people together to joy the sense of “muhibah” among all Malaysian. I am proud to be Malaysian. Yes I do.
Well, everyone can say the slogan but not everyone can really be aware of the unfathomable meaning of it. I was teaching in a secondary school before and I can see that majority students just take it for granted without any guilty feeling. Yes, literally they know what is the meaning of “kemerdekaan” but figuratively it may sound another way round to me, at least at my own perspective. There are too may ways we can show our cavernous adore and appreciation to our beloved country. Not merely by standing still while singing “Negaraku”, or celebrating the independent day extremely you may say that you truly understand the meaning of independent day. But you can show it maybe throughout the national agenda which is embedded in the educational perspectives and curriculum (just like nation and nationhood ideology), behavior and respect and awareness to each others and always be alert to global agenda which may swift your understanding toward independent ideology. So to conclude these tenets, I shall say “ minda dan jati diri yang berakal glokal (the mind and self identity which has global and local element and) is a must in order to be firm to stand tall while dealing with global nation especially when there is demand between us (postcolonial) with other nations especially our ex-colonizer to cheris and deal with the global needs. The sense of nation and nationhood should be expended to any policies and policy makers in oder to have glokal adenda and policy. Besides that, by having such ideology, I guess we can be aware of being decolonized again. It sounds simple yet hard to be done, isn’t it?
Well, we hardly can point the blame to those people (especially those who born after merdeka) who can really understand the meaning of Merdeka it selft. Coz to feel the exactly meaning you have to get surrounding, psychology and culture supports so you can really have the fullest grasp of what those Independent warriors have been thru. So, what we can do know is to think other new resolutions to help those youngsters in oeder for them to have full of heart’s content of being a Malaysian and be able to articulate as a Malaysian with full of honors (beracuankan Malaysia).
So, I guess, to recap everything, let’s joy and be proud to be Malaysian. Malaysia is a place like no others and to be a Malaysian, we should be proud of Malaysian identities, having national behaviors (perlakuan beracuankan Malaysia) and perspectives all cross times, space and cultures regardless where you may be. So people, Selamat Hari Merdeka dan ingatlah untuk Melaungkan “Saya Anak Malaysia”…..
Take care then, xoxox Josh
