38 Tan Yao Sua and R. Santhiram
global stage. The decision by the government to allow for the establishment
of more private institutions of higher learning that used English as the main
medium of instruction beginning in 1996 had also helped to improve the
proficiency of English among Malaysian students, though such a decision
was also influenced by other intervening factors.
Efforts by the government to improve the proficiency of English
among Malaysian students reached new heights with the implementation
of the policy of teaching science and mathematics in English in 2003 at the
school level. But the implementation of this policy was hotly contested
by the opposition political parties, the Malay nationalists as well as the
Chinese and Indian educationists. In the end, the government was forced
to terminate the policy. However, it was the strong stand of the Malay
nationalists over the threat posed by the policy to the national language
that had played a crucial role in influencing the decision of the government
to terminate the policy. But the termination of the policy did not deter
efforts by the government to address declining standard of English among
Malaysian students.
Nevertheless, these efforts were undertaken together with efforts
to safeguard the national language. It culminated in the introduction
of the bilingual policy of “upholding the Malay language alongside the
strengthening of English” (Memartabatkan Bahasa Malaysia Memperkukuh
Bahasa Inggeris, or MBMMBI). This Malay-English bilingual policy was
subsequently incorporated into the recently launched Malaysia Education
Blueprint (2013–15) and implemented in stages beginning from the
most fundamental level of education, i.e., the primary schools. A host of
intervening measures were put in place by the Blueprint to achieve this
bilingual policy (Ministry of Education Malaysia 2013).
Clearly, the government has resorted to the strategy of glocalization or
“vernacular globalization” (Lingard 2000) in dealing with the contrasting
linguistic needs of the country, which have resulted in “tension between
global and local concerns” (Tollefson and Tsui 2004, p. 290). By glocalization
is meant “the simultaneity — the co-presence — of both universalizing and
particularizing tendencies” (Liu and Guo 2009, p. 153) or “the interplay
of local and global forces” (Anderson-Levitt 2003, p. 28). For one thing,
the MBMMBI policy has engaged the Malay language in a diglossic
relationship with English. In fact, diglossic relationship between languages
has now become a global phenomenon arising from the accelerated pace of
globalization. Daniel Nettle and Suzanne Romaine note that “globalization