Us and Them: The Portrayal of Malaysians and British in Malaysian History Textbooks

Abstract

This article conducts a linguistic analysis of the history textbook from Malaysia. It studies the way language portrays the Malaysians and British during colonization and independence. These periods are chosen because their economic and political changes resulted in social shifts which continue to influence modern Malaysia. The article analyzes the history textbook for secondary years two, three and five. Transitivity from Systemic Functional Linguistics is used as a method of analysis to explain the portrayal of the Malaysians and British during colonization and independence. The linguistic analysis of Participants (the nominal group) and Processes (the verbal group) discloses two major results. First, independence and the Malaysians are portrayed positively in the chapters about independence and identities of class and ethnicity are crucial to understand the Malaysians. Second, colonization and the British are portrayed negatively in the chapters about colonization. This posits a positive us and negative them distinction in the textbook. Hence the language of the history textbook can be interpreted as implying a nationalist version of history.

Singapore in Malaysia: An Examination of Argument Structures in a Malaysian History Textbook

“…Some background is required to understand Claim 1. Through various media, Malaysians have been informed that colonial powers transformed the political and social environment for the worse (Rajandran, 2013). Communism is also a vilified ideology in Malaysia.…”

“…Narratives which are imbibed with little or no reflection are problematic because they influence the collective memory of citizens (Williams, 2014). Students may acquire an unrepresentative version of Malaysian history and be biased towards certain historical episodes (Rajandran, 2013). A narrative which promotes a particular argument often reflects the consensus of powerful groups, and it may reproduce an ethnocentric or nationalist portrayal of history (van Dijk, 2008).…”

“…Scholars have also examined how historical episodes and their participants are evaluated. Some of their findings are: British colonisation is evaluated negatively but the Malayans' and Singaporeans' struggle for independence is evaluated positively (Rajandran, 2013, Tann, 2010; and the pre-military Chilean government is evaluated as incompetent (Oteíza, 2003).…”

Another History Of Malaysia? Expression From ‘Negara’ Sarawak

“…Over a period of almost two decades, the mainstream version of the history of Malaysia has been challenged, subverted, undermined, and threatened (Kheng, 2003;Manickam, 2003;Rajandran, 2012;Santhiram, 1997;Ting, 2014). In fact, the trend of 'rewriting' the Malaysian history began in 1996 (Sharom, 2010).…”

“…Towards the last few years of the 1990s, and transcending the decade that followed, the nation had been overwhelmed by many histories, rather many perspectives, that sought to maintain or strengthen, or lay claim to the nation-building and nationhood (Kheng, 2003;Manickam, 2003;Rajandran, 2012;Santhiram, 1997;Ting, 2014) (Kheng, 2003;Manickam, 2003;Rajandran, 2012;Santhiram, 1997;Ting, 2014). The Malay-centric (and UMNO-centric) perspective of the history of Malaysia was now being complemented and challenged by the versions held by the Chinese, Tamil, Islamic, PAS, DAP, Istana, Iban, Kadazan, Thai, and others.…”