Malaysian language

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Bahasa Malaysia
بهاس مليسيا
Pronunciation [baˈhasə malajˈsiə]
Native to Brunei
Native speakers
16 million  (2000–2004)[1]
Latin (Rumi)
Arabic (Jawi)[2]
Malaysian Braille
Bahasa Malaysia Kod Tangan
Official status
Official language in
Language codes
ISO 639-3 zsm
Glottolog stan1306[3]
Pre-School in Pensiangan, Sabah with teaching materials for Malaysian language.

Malaysian (Malay: Bahasa Malaysia), or Standard Malay, is the official language of Malaysia and a standardized register of the Malacca dialect of Malay. It is over 95% cognate with Indonesian and is spoken natively by over 10 million people. As a second language, it is spoken by an estimated 14 million, mostly Malaysians from ethnic minorities.[4] It is a compulsory subject in primary and secondary school.[5]



Article 152 of the Federation designates Malay as the official language. Between 1986 and 2007, the official term Bahasa Malaysia was replaced by "Bahasa Melayu". Today, in order to recognise that Malaysia is composed of many ethnic groups (and not only the ethnic Malays), the term Bahasa Malaysia has once again become the government's preferred designation for the "Bahasa Kebangsaan" (National Language) and the "Bahasa Persatuan/Pemersatu" (unifying language/lingua franca).[6] The language is sometimes simply referred to as Bahasa or BM.[7]

Writing system[edit]

Main article: Malay alphabet


Extent of use[edit]

The Malaysian language became the sole official language in West Malaysia in 1968, and in East Malaysia gradually from 1974.[clarification needed] English continues, however, to be widely used in professional and commercial fields and in the superior courts. Other minority languages such as Tamil, Punjabi, Gujarati, Malayalam, Telugu, Sindhi, Hindi, Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien and Hakka are also commonly used by the country's large Indian and Chinese ethnic minority populations.

Sounds and grammar[edit]

Further information: Malay language

Borrowed words[edit]

The Malaysian language has most of its words borrowed from Sanskrit, Tamil, Hindi, Persian, Portuguese, Dutch, certain Chinese dialects, Arabic and more recently, English (in particular many scientific and technological terms). Modern Malaysian Malay is also heavily influenced by Indonesian.[8]

Colloquial and contemporary usage[edit]

Main article: Bahasa Rojak


See also[edit]


  1. ^ Malaysian at Ethnologue (17th ed., 2013)
  3. ^ Nordhoff, Sebastian; Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds. (2013). "Standard Malay". Glottolog 2.2. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. 
  4. ^ Ethonologue, "Standard Malay"
  6. ^ Back to Bahasa Malaysia. (2007-06-04). Retrieved on 2010-10-19.

External links[edit]