The sound of an identity: A look into the Singaporean accent

icture this: You’re halfway across the world in a crowded cafe. Around you is the predictable bustle of glasses clinking and chairs scraping the floor. People are talking loudly, but the languages and accents are foreign to you.

Then one voice catches your ear.

You may not catch the entire sentence. You hear no Singlish – no “lah” or “shiok”. But there is something in the way the words are spoken and emphasised, how the pitch rises and falls, a recognisable cadence that gives the speech a distinctive melody.

As if picking up a familiar tune, you instinctively know: It’s the Singaporean accent.

An accent is a combination of features, including how we pronounce consonants and vowels, where we place stress, how we intonate and the unique rhythm of our speech, explains Tan Ying Ying, an associate professor of linguistics and multilingual studies at the School of Humanities in Nanyang Technological University (NTU).

While different communities of people in Singapore have slightly different accents, says Tan, there is a fairly standard set of shared features that sounds Singaporean.

It begins with how we pronounce certain sounds.

The way one speaks is influenced by articulators, which are parts of the body in the mouth, throat and nose that move or shape airflow to create speech sounds.

Consonants are pronounced by blocking or restricting airflow with various articulators, like the lips, tongue or teeth. When pronouncing vowels, air flows out through the mouth freely, while articulators like the lips shape each sound.

Let’s take a look at how vowels and consonants are pronounced in the word “keep”.

Some of these subtle differences in how people produce some consonants and vowels are the building blocks of what makes up an accent.

So what do these differences look like?

While the sentence we looked at shows various features of the Singaporean accent, it is far from exhaustive. Tan believes it may not be possible to pin down all the features that make up an accent.

For instance, vowels are a big part of the Singaporean accent’s sound system.

“Vowels often capture the accent of speakers,” says Christina Low, who holds a PhD in linguistics from NTU. “A difference in vowel sounds can show that you’re from a specific region or country.”

Let’s take a look at how the vowel in the word “dance” is said in different accents.

Another important component of an accent is prosody – the stress, intonation and rhythm of speech.

Adam Chong, an associate professor of phonology and language processing at the University of Oxford, explains that people often describe the Singaporean accent as having a staccato rhythm, with a bit of a sing-song quality.

Our findings draw from just 800 audio recordings, but there are more than three million Singaporeans in the country.

While we can identify broad features of speech that make the Singaporean accent unique, based on the data available, identifying every distinct feature remains a complex – perhaps impossible – task.

What does your Singaporean accent look like?

An accent is more than just how we speak – it reveals where we came from and how we got here.

English was introduced to South-east Asia with the arrival of the British in the late 1700s, reaching Singapore in 1819. But for much of the 19th century, Malay and Malay-based contact languages remained the region’s lingua franca, or common language.

That early history matters because the people who first learnt and spoke English in Singapore helped shape the way the language would eventually sound.

The people who first taught English in Singapore included teachers from British India, Eurasians and Westerners from different countries. The early learners were primarily speakers of Malay-based contact languages like Baba Malay and Kristang and, a little later, speakers of Chinese dialects, says Rebecca Starr, an associate professor of the National University of Singapore’s English, linguistics and theatre Studies department.

“After English-medium schools had been established, you started to have teachers who were educated locally teaching in schools. So, the language backgrounds of early students in these schools accounts for why Malay – as well as Chinese dialects – has a huge impact on the Singaporean accent,” Starr adds.

Some of those influences can still be heard in the way Singaporeans speak English today.

But tracing the origins of an accent is rarely straightforward.

Chong says: “The Singaporean accent doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Especially in these kinds of contact situations, it can be hard to tell what exactly contributed to how the language has evolved.”

Accents, like languages, never stop evolving.

“Academically, we can derive rules and find patterns in language. But if we really think about the way we use it, the fluidity is always there,” says Tan.

“Language is alive, and it doesn’t evolve just because it has to; it evolves because people are making it so,” she adds.

That evolution continues as Singapore becomes more globally connected and Singaporeans become increasingly mobile.

Exposure to other cultures and ways of speaking can, often subconsciously, prompt speakers to adopt new speech patterns – whether for practical reasons, such as being better understood abroad, or social reasons, such as fitting in.

Academics have already observed some changes among younger Singaporeans. For instance, Chong says, some are becoming more rhotic – meaning that they pronounce the “r” sound in words where it appears in the spelling.

For example, instead of pronouncing “car” as “kah”, a more rhotic speaker would pronounce the “r” at the end, as in “kahr”. The same can be seen in words such as “figure”, where the final “r” is pronounced by rhotic speakers.

One possible reason is increased exposure to American English.

“In general, rhoticity is associated with American English. People could be influenced by things they watch on Netflix or any other American media they consume. They may think that Americans are more trendy, modern and fun. So, they might adopt some of their speech features, like rhoticity,” says Tan.

But not all academics agree. Starr argues that reduced exposure to British English – which, like Singapore English, is non-rhotic – rather than increased exposure to American English, may be contributing to the change.

Low says her research in language variation and change shows that the Singaporean accent is increasingly localised.

“If you compare younger and older speakers, the younger speakers’ vowels tend to be less intense and deliberate. There is less effort in trying to approximate the vowels of an external variety such as British or American English,” she says.

Why does an accent shift? Because of what we perceive as socially valuable.

“Prestige is not random. It is driven by societal norms or what society or communities of speakers believe will allow them to associate more with what is considered to be valuable,” says Tan.

Prestige has traditionally been closely tied to institutional power – financial, educational or political. But today, social media also has a say in who gets to wield that influence.

“With influencers, for instance, the power is slightly different. It’s a kind of widespread media power – the power of the masses and the cool,” Tan says. “They may not be royalty or politicians, but they have soft power and it can change what people view as valuable.”

For example, content creators with large followings, as well as media personalities, may encourage audiences to pick up features associated with American English – particularly when an American-sounding accent is perceived as more aspirational or fashionable.

One such feature is flapping, a characteristic of many American English varieties in which the “t” or “d” sound between vowels may be pronounced as a quick tap, causing the consonants in words such as “writer” and “rider” to sound alike.

The Speak Good English Movement in Singapore is one example of how language policy can influence those perceptions. Launched in 2000, it was intended to address concerns that Singlish was becoming too prevalent and could undermine Singapore’s ambitions as a first-world economy.

“Policies have been put in place to try to raise English standards, but at the same time, the messaging that comes through runs contrary to that, and that is ‘we’re never going to be good enough’,” says Tan.

She sees this as part of a uniquely Singaporean tension, where remnants of a post-colonial mindset can persist in the way some Singaporeans view English – as a language that does not quite belong to them.

But she argues that it is time to reconsider that idea.

She says: “Colonialism is an old word, and we are so far removed from it now. And if we start thinking about the language that we acquire, and what we grow up with, and what has been nativised in this particular land, then this is what is ours.”

The sounds that mark the Singaporean accent today may not be the same ones that define it a generation from now.

Some linguists posit that Singaporeans will sound more homogenised; others think they will sound more diverse. In either case, the widespread use of the Singaporean accent signals that Singaporeans are more comfortable and confident about the way they sound and speak than they were in the past.

“I think there are many possible ways the accent can shift. But my guess is that the younger generation is pretty proud of the fact that they are Singaporeans, and there isn’t an external standard to follow,” says Low.

A local content creator and actress, Caitanya Tan, who has created several viral videos on the Singaporean accent, thinks that Singaporeans need to be even more confident in the way they speak.

She says: “When I started creating these videos, it was because I didn’t understand why I shouldn’t be proud to be Singaporean. If we don’t stand up for ourselves, then who is going to stand up for us?”

In the same vein, NTU’s Tan Ying Ying believes that Singaporeans should embrace how they sound.

“This accent is ours,” she says. “It has evolved over time, and with different communities of speakers coming together.”