6/5/2023 0 Comments Tuhfat al nafis![]() It follows then that a child who is brought up in a particular society speaking a particular language is already “socialized or “culturalized” with an identity from the day he or she is born. ![]() Human beings therefore enter a world already filled with words or linguistic categories which has assimilated social and historical experiences. Lexical borrowings from the Portuguese in Bahasa Malaysia (Malaysian language) are also seen through common Malay words such as bola (“ball”) and amah (“Chinese nurse”). For example, bearing the marks of culture and history, language carries with it past identities and this is seen in the language of the Sejarah Melayu (“Malay Annals”), which exemplifies the identity of 17th century Malay (Johor-Riau) aristocratic society just as the Tuhfat al-Nafis (“The Precious Gift”) exemplifies a later 19th century society (cf. Language and identity are, as Joseph (2004: 13) concludes, “ultimately inseparable”. A study of identities is also closely related to the study of language, not least because language is the principal means to hold and communicate thoughts and emotions (Sapir, 1949 Spolsky, 2010 Bucholtz and Kira, 2010). ![]() Common identity markers include parental status, ethnicity, age, gender, job, religion, personality and political persuasion. ![]() ![]() It is “sociolinguistics’ home ground” (Coupland, 2001: 18). A brief look through recent publications in sociolinguistics convinces us that the notion of identity is central. ![]()
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