English and Islam: A Clash ofCivilizations?

Ratnawati Mohd-AsrafInternational Islamic University Malaysia

There is a substantial amount of literature documenting the attitudinal resistance ofMuslims towards English and the supposed conflict between English and Islam. Thisarticle provides a critical review of the writings and research on the issue and dis-cusses some of the reasons behind this resistance, focusing on Muslims in Malaysia.It argues that although English is rooted in the Judeo-Christian culture, and oftenviewed as a primary vehicle for the transmission of Western values, the learning ofEnglish is not necessarily in conflict with Islamic values. This article also presents anIslamic perspective on the role of language and the attitude that Muslims shouldadopt towards learning languages. It concludes by emphasizing the need for Englishteachers to take into account the socio-cultural aspects of learning English whenteaching Muslim students, and for Muslims to value the importance of learning Eng-lish for the purpose of acquiring contemporary knowledge.

Key Words: Islam, English, Malaysia, attitudinal resistance, appropriation

There can be no denying the immense power and status that English has assumedin the world today. From being a language that was once primarily spoken in whatis now known as Great Britain, and later, in its numerous colonies, it has become anofficial language in 52 countries and is spoken and understood by more than onethird of the inhabitants of the world (Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia, 2002, ascited in ONeill, 2002). As an international and a world language, its influencespans the entire globe, and there is hardly any country today that does not use Eng-lish in one way or another or that is not affected by its spread. More than being justa language of communication, English, by virtue of its influence, has the capacityto empower, just as it has the capacity to divide. While it accords people with op-portunities for educational and social advancement, unequal access to it divides

JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE, IDENTITY, AND EDUCATION, 4(2), 103118Copyright 2005, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Requests for reprints should be sent to Ratnawati Mohd-Asraf, International Islamic UniversityMalaysia, Subang Jaya, 47500 Petaling Jaya, Malaysia. E-mail: ratnawati@iiu.edu.my

people into the English educated and the non-English educated, the elites of soci-ety and the non-elites, and the haves and the have-nots. English is also seen bymany as being the embodiment and carrier of Judeo-Christian cultural values, andthat of Western civilization, and conjures various imagespositive as well as neg-ativeto the myriad people that use it.

In the same way that English is more than just a language, Islam is more thanjust a religion. Indeed, it is a way of life, with its own worldview; a way of look-ing at the world that is differenton some fundamental issuesfrom that of theWestern world. And just as English has conjured various images of its influence,roles, and functions, so has Islam. Especially in the aftermath of 9/11, much ofwhat has been written about Islam in English has not been positive and reflectsvarious degrees of misconception about its nature and its influence on Muslimsworldwide.

One of the many areas where English and Islam come into contact is in the teach-ingofEnglishasasecondor foreign language. In the last fewdecades,muchhasbeenwritten on the attitudinal resistance of Muslims towards English, and lately, on thesupposed conflict between English and Islam. How do Muslims, in fact, feel aboutEnglish, and is there a conflict between English and Islam? If so, what is the nature ofthis conflict? This article provides a critical review of the writings and research onthe issue, and discusses some of the reasons behind this resistance, focusing on Mus-lims in Malaysia. It also discusses the Islamic perspective toward English, as agreedupon by the majority of Muslim thinkers and jurists, and on the role of language inshaping the thoughts and identities of Muslims. It concludes by emphasizing theneed for English teachers to take into account the socio-cultural aspects of learningEnglish when teaching Muslim students, and for Muslims to value the importance oflearning English for the purpose of acquiring contemporary knowledge.

IMAGES OF ENGLISH AMONG MUSLIMS

In surveying the literature on the teaching and learning of English in the Muslimworld, one is likely to come across descriptions of Muslims attitudes towards thislanguage. Hyde (1994), for example, mentions that in Morocco, there areeducationists who have urged that English be disassociated from the cultures of theEnglish speaking countries, and instead, be taught as a purely instrumental tool,nothing more than a linguistic means to certain ends. The reason for this, he men-tions, is that in Morocco, English is often perceived as a tool for imperialisma per-ception that resultedfromMoroccos longexperiencewithFrenchandSpanishcolo-nialist rule. The same concern about the cultural implications of teaching English isreflected in an ongoing controversy in English departments of the universities in theArab world on the amount of time that should be spent on English literature. Oppo-nents of the teaching of English literature (whether English or American) or those

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who wish to see at least a reduction in the time spent on teaching literature, argue thatintroducing literature intoEnglishprogramswould, ineffect, be tantamount to intro-ducingasubjectthat representsaworldmorepowerful,moredominating,andmorecompelling than our own a culture which has, in reality, colonized or dominatedours for substantially prolonged periods of time (Obediat, 1997, p. 30). Haggan(1998) also describes the unease and concern that her students (whom she describedas coming from conservative Kuwait) felt when studying English literature, whichrequired of them an appreciation of values and traditions that are contrary to thoseupheld in their religion and practiced in their society, while more recently, al-Harabi(2002) describes how the teaching of English in primary schools in Saudi Arabia hasbecomeahotlydebated issue there,withonegroupbelieving thatknowledgeofEng-lish is a basic requirement in primary schools while another arguing that exposingour young children to a foreign language and culture will be a calamity for their cul-tural and religious upbringing (p. 1).

MALAYSIAN MUSLIMS PERCEPTIONS OF ENGLISH

In Malaysia, similar observations have been noted. Asmah Hj. Omar (1992a), forexample, points out that among the factors that affect attitudes towards the learningof English in Malaysia are beliefs about learning a language. Asmah states that inthe context of Malaysians learning English as a second or foreign language, thereis always the opinion that learning another language will turn the learner intosomething else, that is, after acquiring another language he will not be the same in-dividual that he was when he had not acquired that language (p. 119). Asmahelaborates by stating that this can either be viewed positively, in which one sees theadvantages of knowing another language or other languages in addition to his orher native language, or it could be taken negatively, in which one sees the demeritsor even the danger of knowing a second language. Asmah cites examples ofthose who believe that to learn English is to learn the language of the Christians(p. 120), or that of the colonialists (p. 122), or that it would make learners apethe white man (p. 122). Asmah emphasizes, however, that these examples werebased on her own observations, the first of which was the experience of a group ofteachers teaching English in an eastern state in Malaysia, related to her during a na-tional seminar on language teaching in 1987, while the other two were based on theobservations she had made some four decades before her paper was written. Thereis the perception among many Malaysians that these statements are made primar-ily by the Malay Muslims, although Asmah states that this attitude exists in all theethnic groups in Malaysia. It was these observations that prompted her to carry outa study on Malaysian students attitudes towards English (Asmah Haji Omar,1992a), which I will discuss in a later section of this article.

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One study on the attitude of Malay Muslims towards English that has appearedin several writings, including Pennycooks (1994) The Cultural Politics of Englishas an International Language, in a section on English and Islam, is that of Og(1989). In this study, in which he interviewed 50 undergraduate students at the In-ternational Islamic University Malaysia on what English meant to them and whatplace it should have in Malaysia, Og reported that all 50 students believed thatEnglish was the means through which Western culture entered the country.Twenty-two students wanted Arabic to be raised to equal status with English as acompulsory subject in the university while 28 wanted Arabic completely to takeover the role of English in Malaysia. Og argued that the Malays were undergoinga rejection of Western ideas and practices: English has been perceived by the ru-ral Malays to be a Western language with little or no place in their lives. A viewexpressed by many is that English is a kafir (non-Islamic) language (p. 314).

Several questions need to be raised with regard to Ogs (1989) findings.Firstly, he supplied very few details of his research proceduredetails such as howthe students were selected and whether it was aimed at trying to represent the rele-vant aspects such as the department or region they were from (students from anArabic studies/department background are more likely to favor emphasis onArabic, while students coming from urban areas are more likely to be more com-fortable with English than their rural counterparts), and the steps he took to protecthis study from interview bias. The fact that he was an instructor at the university atthe time the study was carried out could have led the students to provide answersthat they thought he would like to hear, answers that reflect support for universitypolicy. For example, during the time the study was carried out, both students andfaculty were acutely aware of the stress and importance placed by the Universityon the mastering of Arabic, as it is a language that Malays, in general, have notbeen able to master to an acceptable level. (In these last few years, however, therehas been constant stress placed by the university authorities on improving Englishlanguage proficiency, as the university insists on high proficiency in English, and ithas been noticed that students have not been performing sufficiently well in thelanguage.) These aspects should have been sufficiently described, as a differentcombination of these factors could have affected the results of the study in differentways.

In Lee Su Kims (2003) study of 14 adult Malaysian women on how the Englishlanguage impacts the construction of their socio-cultural identities, we are able tocatch a glimpse of how English is viewed as a colonial language through the eyesof some of her Malay participants.

Fazira, a Malay Muslim participant who is fluent in English, believed that someof her Malay friends interpreted her use of English as showing off, because, asshe said, previously only the elite, the educated speak English so the rest of theMalays, you know, felt inferior. She also felt that some Malays in Malaysia are ofthe view that those [Malays] who use English are trying to be like the Whites

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(Lee Su Kim, 2003, p. 145), which she attributed to the fact that English is seen bysome Malay Muslims as a relic of colonialism.

Another participant, Azrina, a Malay Muslim student from Kedah, a predomi-nantly rural state in northern Malaysia, felt that there was resentment towards us-ing English in certain circles: Among some Malays, they always associate Eng-lish as not being Muslim. they associate English with religion (Lee Su Kim,2003, p. 145). Azrina adds, I heard in Kelantan [a state in north eastern West Ma-laysia] from my friends they associate it [English] with Christianity (p. 148).Azrina, however, emphasized that she disagreed with this view, and argued thatmastery of English has not made her less Malay. She said that when one learns alanguage and its culture, one does not necessarily internalize the values of the cul-ture, especially if one has a strong cultural identity.

Lee Su Kim (2003) described how her participants possessed a wide range ofidentities, and depending on the contexts and the reference groups with whomthey were interacting, they would often switch identities to fit in with the groupidentity expectations. Indeed, the switching of identities was observed amongthose participants that came from other ethnic communities as well. She de-scribed how Queenie, a Chinese participant, complained that she wasmarginalized by a group of Chinese students on campus because she could notspeak Mandarin and because she appeared too English and too western-ized. Lee Su Kim explained that this is because those students, who came fromthe Chinese medium schools, defined a Chinese as someone who can speakMandarin. However, unlike her Malay counterparts who switched to Malay orsuppressed or avoided the use of English in such situations, Queenie, not beingable to use Mandarin fluently, used resistance strategiesshe used English evenmore to annoy the people in her group.

Lee Su Kims (2003) study illustrates the close relationship between her par-ticipants use of language and their identity. And, although it was not the aim ofher study, it also offers us a glimpse into the attitudes of some Malays towardsEnglish through the eyes of her participants. Many Malaysians will testify to thefact that such feelings towards English do exist, but one has also to ask: Howprevalent are these attitudes? Are these views reflective of the majority of Mus-lims in Malaysia? What are the implications of believing that this attitude iswidely held among Muslim students? However, before going into a discussion ofthis issue, it would be pertinent to go into the history of the spread of English inMalaysia.

THE CONTEXT

Malaysia is a multiracial, multilingual, multicultural, and multireligious countryof 23.27 million people, of whom 65.1% are Malays and indigenous groups, 26%

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Chinese, and 7% Indians. There are about 14 million Muslims in Malaysia, orabout 60.4% of the total population, with the Malays constituting the largest group,although one finds a small but growing number of Muslims among the Chinese, In-dians, as well as the indigenous communities. The second largest religious groupare the Buddhists (19.2%), followed by the Christians (9.1%), the Hindus (6.3 %),and Confucians and those belonging to other Chinese religions (2.6%; Departmentof Statistics Malaysia, 2001). Considered part of South East Asia, Malaysia wasonce a British colony before she gained independence in 1957.

In Malaysia, English has been given the official status as the second most im-portant language, the official language being Bahasa Melayu, or Malay. Prior toindependence, and for slightly more than a decade following independence, Eng-lish was used as a medium of instruction in English medium schools. However, forthe purposes of nation building and to create a Malaysian national identity, its useas a medium of instruction was gradually phased out and replaced by Malay, be-ginning with the first graders that entered school in 1970. By 1982, all schools inMalaysia used Malay as the medium of instruction (Asmah Hj. Omar, 1992b).English, however, continued to be taught, and still continues to be taught inschools, as a second language, and as one of the subjects in the curriculum.

THE SPREAD OF ENGLISH IN MALAYSIA

In order to understand the meanings that Malaysian Muslims have associated withEnglish, it is important to consider the social, cultural, political, and economic cir-cumstances under which it spread. In Malaysia, English has always been viewed interms of its socio-political status ever since it first entered this country. As AsmahHaji Omar (1992a) states,

It came as a colonial and remained, until after Independence, a prestige language ac-cessible only to the privileged few. It was one of the factors that assisted in drawingthe line between the haves and the have-nots, the urban and the rural, the modern andthe traditionally educated, and so on. (p. 121)

Before the coming of the British, schooling for the Malays consisted primarilyof religious classes conducted by Muslim missionaries. (The local people thenconsisted primarily of the Malays and the indigenous peoples, although there werealso a small number of Arab, Indian, and Chinese traders that had settled there.)Later, with the expansion of British influence in the Malay States, and with theirbringing larger numbers of Indian and Chinese immigrants into the country to pro-vide labor for the tin mines and rubber estates, respectively, the British started de-veloping an education policy for the locals.

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For a long time, the British maintained a divide and rule policy (Khoo, 1966;Sheppard, 1959; Wahid, 1970), keeping the different ethnic groups separate, asthis policy worked in their favor. Hence, they provided a vernacular education, thatis, teaching the natives in their native language. According to Asmah Haji Omar(1992b), keeping the Malays away from the towns and the English schools waspart and parcel of British colonial policy. Its aim was to make the son of the fish-erman or peasant a more intelligent fisherman or peasant than his father had been.It did not open the doors to a wider world (Gullick, 1983, p. 161, as quoted inAsmah Haji Omar, 1992b). According to Pennycook (1994), vernacular educationwas intended to

inculcate habits of industry, obedience and punctuality, to prevent students from en-tertaining any ambitions above their humble station in life, and to encourage them tofeel thankful rather than resentful towards their colonizers. Most importantly,however, was the view that Malays were inherently and incurably suited to their agri-cultural life and that the purpose of vernacular education was to maintain this way oflife. (p. 88)

In the early stages of British rule, English was introduced to a select few, withthe aim of helping them fill the clerical positions that they needed for a smoothrunning of their administration. The British saw the dangers of allowing the lo-cal people to have an English education, and felt that teaching English on a largescale would lead the Malayan children to develop an inflated sense of theirown importance (Gaudart, 1987, p. 19) which would consequently make themlook upon manual labor with disdain. (For a more extensive discussion on Brit-ish colonial policy in Malaysia, see Gaudart, 1987; Asmah Haji Omar, 1992a,1992b, 1992c, 1992d, 1992e; Pennycook, 1994.) However, just before the turn ofthe twentieth century, there was a shift in British policy. It was advocated thatthe teaching of English be stepped up to meet the demand for commercial andadministrative services. Hence, British educational policy was designed to meetthe labor needs of the Colonial powers-that-be (Gaudart, 1987; Pennycook,1994).

While still maintaining the vernacular system of education, in which there werethree separate types of school systems that taught in three separate mediums of in-structionMalay, Chinese, and Tamilfor the students of the respective ethnicgroups, the British later introduced schools that used English as a medium of in-struction. The earliest of these schools were built by the Christian missionaries,whose aim was not only to provide education, but also to spread the Christian faith(Asmah Haji Omar, 1992e). Indeed, as Omar asserts, conversion to Christianitywas mainly done through English. This was a major reason why many Malay andMuslim parents, who hold deeply to Islamic teachings, did not, at the time, want tosend their children to English-medium schools, which were practically synony-

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mous with missionary schools. Many feared that their children might beChristianized.

Many Muslim parents were also concerned that learning English might leadto their children becoming more westernized, which is seen as something nega-tive if it contradicts Islamic teachings or principles. Perhaps there might be somejustification for the parents concern, because as Gaudart (1987) notes, what thedifferent Malaysian ethnic groups that attended English-medium schools had incommon was a mutually shared worldview that was Western in orientation (p.20).

Of the four types of schools, the English medium schools were the most devel-oped. English schools had better physical plants and facilities, better qualifiedteachers, and spent much more per pupil than did the Malay or Tamil vernacularschools (Dropout Report, 1973, pp.112114, as cited in Gaudart, 1987). The Eng-lish medium schools also offered students a chance of upward social mobility.English medium schools were the prestige schools, and it was felt that the typeand depth of knowledge they offered were superior to that of the vernacularschools (Gaudart, 1987, p. 20). This situation had implications for the society as awhole, because these English medium schools were mainly urban schools, whichwere not heavily attended by the Malays since they were confined to the rural agri-cultural areas, and because the Malays could not afford the fees charged by theEnglish medium schools (Asmah Hj. Omar, 1992d). Since the majority of those inthe urban areas were Chinese, it was essentially this group that benefitted fromWestern education. The only Malays that attended the English medium schoolswere the royalty and the aristocrats. Asmah Haji Omar (1992c) states that the factthat English was available only to the urban and the more privileged during the co-lonial period, as well as to the upper crust of the Malay society had, to some extent,implanted an attitude of resentment among the rural people toward the language atthe time.

Thus, the association of English with colonialism and Christianity, and the con-cern about being westernized as a result of learning and using English led to nega-tive attitudes, among some Malay Muslims at the time, towards English. The iden-tity of the Malays then, just as it was for the Chinese and the Indians, was closelytied to their language. Those Malaysians that were educated in the vernacular weremore Malay, Chinese, or Indian than those that came from the English me-dium schools, who tended to be more westernized. Furthermore, because thoseMalays that had been educated in the English medium were the royalty, the aristo-crats, and the more affluent Malays that could afford an English education, and be-cause they were westernized in their thinking, there was an emotional distance be-tween the two groups of Malays. The English-educated group was perceived by theMalay-educated group as thinking of themselves as better than they, as more edu-cated, as behaving in a westernized manner, and so on. For a long time, these im-ages lingered in the minds of the Malay-educated Malays. All these images con-

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tributed to the emotional distance, indifference, negative attitudes, and evenresentment towards English.

PRESENT MALAY/MUSLIM ATTITUDESTOWARDS ENGLISH

However, almost 50 years have passed since independence, and there are indicationsthat attitudes towards English are changing. In her case study of three rural Malay-sian schools on the attitudes of the students towards English, in which she and herco-researchers administered questionnaires to one class of students from eachschool (two classes comprised Malay Muslim students and one class consisted ofChinese, non-Muslim students), and in which she interviewed selected studentsbased on their responses to the questionnaire, Ratnawati (in press) found that all thestudents disagreed with the statement, Learning English is a waste of time, whileall but one disagreed with the statement, It is not important to learn English. In ad-dition to recognizing the utilitarian value of English, almost all the students inter-viewed were of the view that English is important, To help us increase our knowl-edge, or, as they had stated in Malay, Untuk menambah ilmu pengetahuan kita.There was also one 13-year-old Malay student who, when asked why it is importantto study English (after she had responded in the affirmative when asked if it is impor-tant to study English), responded by saying, Nanti dapat pahala, which, translatedmeans, [When we learn English], we will be rewarded by Allah, reflecting the Is-lamic worldview that one will earn Gods pleasure when one seeks knowledge andwhen one learns languages (in this case, English) in order to seek knowledge. Thefact that she had associated the learning of English with earning the pleasure of Godnotonlyreflectsagoodunderstandingof theIslamicworldviewbyapersonasyoungas 13, but also reflects the fact that she viewed the learning of English positively.

On whether or not they will lose their cultural values if they use English often,Ratnawati also found that more than 90% of the students disagreed while six stu-dents (three were Malays and three were Chinese) agreed. However, a higher per-centage of students (a total of 34.4%) agreed with the statement, The more welearn English the more we will think like the English or the Americans. This maybe explained by the fact that the wording of the statement is not as extreme as thestatement, I will lose my cultural values Of those that agreed, 23.5% wereChinese and 10.9 % were Malays. It was quite a surprise that there were a numberof Chinese students who agreed with the two statements, as this view has almost al-ways been associated with the Malays. One Chinese girl, when interviewed toprobe further into the issue, expressed the following view: They [those that oftenuse English] are a bit different. They dont think like we do.

Similar findings were found by Asmah Haji Omar (1992a), in an earlier studyof the attitudes of undergraduate students towards English. In this study, a total of

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167 students studying English in a Malaysian university coming from seven differ-ent faculties responded to a questionnaire eliciting, among other things, their atti-tudes towards English and the learning of English, and towards people using Eng-lish. On the issue of their attitude towards people using English, 12%, or 20 out ofthe 167 students felt that people from different ethnic groups who used English intheir interactions did so because they wanted to show off. (This was also high-lighted by one of Lee Su Kims, 2003, participants.) Of these, 8 were Chinese and12 were Malays. On whether they felt that those who speak English fluently arethose who will adopt Western culture, only 13%, or 21 students thought so. Ofthese, 16 were Chinese, 2 were Indians, and 3 were Malays. Asmah was surprisedat the finding, because all this time, the popular perception was that the negative at-titude towards English as it pertains to culture exists with the Malays, and not somuch with the other groups.

Positive attitudes towards English were also found by Washima, Harshita, andNaysmith (1996), who sought to investigate the claim that a conflict may exist be-tween the implicit values underlying the English language and Islamic values. Inthis case study of a state-funded, academically selective, Islamic residentialall-boys school, in which the students were selected from throughout a certain statein Malaysia and two other neighboring states based on their academic performancein a national assessment examination, the researchers found, from the total of 100students that answered the questionnaire, and from the 26 students that were inter-viewed to clarify their responses to the statements in the questionnaire, that the ma-jority of the students had a positive attitude towards English.

On the value of learning English, a student said, [English] is useful, and for aMuslim, mastering English is something to be proud of. Imams [religious lead-ers] who can use English can communicate with imams from other countries,while another said, By seeking knowledge through English we are using it in thesame way that they (the Westerners) used Arabic. Both statements not only reflecttheir positive attitudes towards English, but reflect also how they have associatedthe learning of English with a religious purpose. The second statement is very in-teresting in that it reflects the students knowledge (which is not surprising, sincehe came from an academically selective religious school) of how Western civiliza-tion had used Arabic for their bettermentreflecting a time when Arabic was thelingua franca of knowledge, ideas, and scienceand how he now urges his fellowMuslims to do the same thing as the West had doneto use English to gain theknowledge that is conveyed in English. In other words, he was suggesting howEnglish should be appropriated, to use Pennycooks (1994) term, for Muslimsown purposes.

On the attitude of the students toward Western values, one student noted,Western culture does not necessarily mean negative culture. We can learn Englishbut not copy the Western way of life (p. 230), while another said, Learning thelanguage doesnt mean adopting the culture (p. 230). The students also made a

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distinction between learning a language and adopting its culture, We wont de-velop if we reject a language because of its culture. A language is just a tool. Thats why we learn English. Washima, Harshita, and Naysmith reported that theschool authorities had an open attitude toward English. English was not regardedas a threat to Islamic values, and was actively encouraged in both the formal andwritten curriculum of the school. However, aspects of Western youth culture wereactively frowned upon.

The students studied by Washima, Harshita, and Naysmith (1996) were of theview that Malay Muslim attitudes towards English were changing: The Malaysare changing from having negative attitudes towards a more positive attitude. Werealize that English is no longer the language of non-Muslims but is necessary forthe development of self (individuals), race, religion, and nation (p. 233). The re-searchers stated that the students appeared to be confident and that they were incontrolthat they were not being controlled by the English language and that theyviewed the learning and using of English as not necessarily being in conflict withIslam.

Hence, some strong evidence suggests that while negative attitudes towards Eng-lish may still exist among some Malay Muslims, the situation is changing, and manyof them, in fact, now have positive attitudes towards the language. Based on myknowledge and observations as a teacher educator, instructor, and researcher whohas been immersed, for more than two decades, in issues pertaining to the teachingand learning of English in Malaysia and attitudes towards English, and as an insiderinto the Malay Muslim attitudes towards English, I would say that there are few Ma-lays todaywhoviewEnglishnegatively,orasthe languageof theChristiansor thatof the colonialists, although this feeling might have been strong before independ-ence or in the first few decades after independence. In the decades after independ-ence, the Malays were trying to free themselves of their colonial masters and Eng-lish was closely tied to this colonial past. Malay identity was closely tied to the use ofthe Malay language. However, with the increasing realization of the importance ofEnglish, of the fact that fewer opportunities are open to those who are not proficientin Englishnot only in terms of employment but also in terms of career and socialadvancement, and given the fact there has been continual emphasis, by the Malay-sian government, the Ministry of Education, and the media, on the importance ofEnglishand theneed forMalaysians tobeproficient inEnglish,manyMalays see theneed to learn, and want to learn the language.

LANGUAGE, WORLDVIEW, AND IDENTITY

A significant amount of literature exists regarding the concern that some Muslimshave about English. This concern can be understood by looking at how languageand worldview impact upon the identities of Muslims.

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Al-Attas, a prominent thinker in the contemporary Muslim world, in his bookThe concept of education in Islam (1980), and in Prolegomena to the Metaphysicsof Islam (1995), argues that language reflects ontology, that is, the nature of truthand reality as understood by a religion, culture, and civilization. Al-Attas describeshow the languages of all Muslim peoples have been infused by what he terms theIslamic basic vocabulary, which projects a distinctly Islamic worldview in theMuslim mind. This basic vocabulary includes key concepts such as God, religion,truth, knowledge, education, reality, justice, freedom, and so on, which are funda-mentally different on some points from the Western conceptions of them. For ex-ample, the concept of knowledge (Ilm), as seen from an Islamic perspective, in-cludes not only the sensory and intelligible realms, but more importantly, the realmof the spirit. According to al-Atlas, this infusion occurred historically with thespread of Islam, and the degree to which the languages have infused the Islamic ba-sic vocabulary depended on the cultural and intellectual level of the speakers. Inthis way, al-Attas asserts, the languages of Muslim peoples have been Islamised;that is, their languages have evolved and have included certain changes in how theyconceptualised certain key terms such that they now project the Islamic worldview.

Al-Attas (1978) also maintains that because a person lives within a particularreligious (or non-religious) framework, culture, and civilization, and since lan-guage is also the carrier of the worldview of a religion, culture and civilization, hisor her sense of identity is deeply tied to language. Generally, however, Muslimidentity is defined by Islam, which contains within itself principles and institutionsstressing permanence, although allowing for necessary change, and which definesacceptable codes of behavior; sets limits on what Muslims are allowed to do, and isthe lens through which many Muslims filter what is considered good, ethical, andso on (al-Attas, 1978; Iqbal, 1965; Wan Daud, 1989, 1998). The extent to whichMuslims use Islam as a framework will, of course, depend on the knowledge andunderstanding they have of Islam, not only as a religion in a narrow sense but alsoas a culture, a way of life, and a civilization.

When Muslims find themselves using English, there are those who will per-ceive a conflict between the cultural values and worldview as conveyed throughEnglish and their own, Islamic values. The values in question may be the valuesunderlying the assumptions and practices of English Language Teaching, as dis-cussed extensively by Pennycook (1994) and Canagarajah (1999), while theworldview as it is meant here is the worldview that is conveyed through Englishthrough its key terms and concepts (Muslims will encounter the same conflictwhen using other languages that project a worldview that is antithetical to the Is-lamic worldview). Although there may be some, or many areas where the Islamicand Western worldview of a particular concept (as conveyed through English) con-verge, there are also areas where they are in conflict (al-Attas, 1995; Wan Daud,1998). To resolve this tension, Muslim scholars such as al-Attas and Wan Daudhave argued that Muslims separate the foreign elements from these concepts and

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infuse them with the Islamic elements. This process, which they have termed theIslamization of contemporary knowledge, or the viewing of concepts from an Is-lamic perspective, is aimed at synthesizing, transforming, and eliminating ele-ments that are foreign to the Islamic worldview such that they fit accordingly intothe vision of truth and reality of Islam as well as its ethical and legal frameworks.This does not mean, however, that non-Muslims are expected to conform to the Is-lamic worldview, although Muslims have often felt that Western civilization,through the dominance of English, imposes upon others its values and worldview,such as its concepts of human rights, womens rights, freedom, and so on.

It is important to underscore the point that despite the conflict, or discord, asperceived by some Muslims, between Islamic values and some of the Western val-ues as conveyed through English, it is considered desirable, in the Islamicworldview, to learn other languages and to know and appreciate the differencesamong various communities. The Quran made a very important pronouncementin this regard: Oh mankind: We created you from a single pair of a male and a fe-male, and made you into nations and tribes, that you may know each other (not thatyou may despise each other). Verily the most honored among you in the sight ofGod is the most God-conscious of you (The Quran, 49:13; see Ali, 1989). Simi-larly, the Quran commands Muslims to invite people to the path of God withwisdom, and to argue with them in ways that are best and most gracious (TheQuran, 16:125; see Ali, 1989). How else can all this be accomplished but to learn,and in fact, master, the language of other nations or peoples?

The sayings attributed to the Prophet Muhammad, Wisdom is the lost propertyof the Muslims, which means that Muslims should benefit from the wisdom that isobtained from other civilizations, and Seek knowledge even until China, alsoshow the importance, in the Islamic worldview, of learning other languages for thepurpose of acquiring knowledge, which is considered an act of divine worship, forthis could not be accomplished unless Muslims strive to acquire the languagesthrough which that knowledge is transmitted.

Al-Attas, along with many other Muslim scholars before him, classifies thelearning of other languages as fard kifayah (or communal obligation), whichmeans that there has to be a certain number of educated Muslims who should mas-ter certain languages so that they can acquire the knowledge that could be obtainedthrough those languages. This is even more so for English, a dominant world lan-guage, the language through which much of contemporary knowledge is obtained,and, for the present, a language that is necessary to be mastered in order that coun-tries may be globally competitive.

The concern, apprehension, and even fear that some Muslims may have aboutlearning English is mainly due to their belief that they may become westernized orsecularized as a result. Many Muslim jurists, such as al-Uthaymeen (1997), havealso expressed the concern that English should not be learnt at the expense ofArabic or their native languages. Hence, Phillipsons (1992) notion of linguicism

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is a legitimate fear in many Muslim countries, as Arabic holds special significancefor Muslims in that it (Classical Arabic) is the language of the Quran. Muslimsthat have lived under colonialist and imperialist rule may have formed even stron-ger impressions against English, or developed negative attitudes towards English,associating English with the colonialists or the imperialists. For the present peopleof Iraq or Afghanistan, who may see the Americans as invaders and not libera-tors, it is very likely that they may have developed a dislike, or even resentment,towards English as they may associate English with the people whom they per-ceive as transgressors.

Putting extreme circumstances aside, Muslims should not consider English athreat to their values and identity. English should be seen as an important languageto be acquired because it is a major language through which we acquire much ofmodern-day knowledge. As I have argued in a previous article (see Ratnawati,1997), Muslims should not fear that learning or using English will automaticallylead to their becoming westernized or secularized, although they may have noticedthat the more westernized Muslims also happen to be those that are proficient inEnglish. If Islam acts as a socializing factor, if the learners are socialized into theIslamic worldview, and if Muslims are firmly grounded in their knowledge of Is-lam, it is less likely that they will be easily influenced by ideas and values that arecontrary to their own. It is possible to learn, and in fact, to be highly proficient inEnglish and still maintain ones identity as a Muslim. In fact, students should beled to reflect upon those whom they know in their society who are highly proficientin English and yet who have maintained their identities as Muslims. It is the knowl-edge of who they are and believing in the values that they profess that would pre-vent them from becoming westernized.

CONCLUSION

Teaching English as a foreign or second language involves more than a mere knowl-edge of teaching approaches and pedagogy. It requires, among other things, thatteachers be aware of the students value and belief systems, as these aspects shapetheir attitudes towards the language. As Phillipson (1992), Pennycook, (1994), andCanagarajah (1999) have argued, teachers should also be aware of the social, cul-tural, political, and economic circumstances under which English spread in thesecountries, as these factors also play a role in shaping attitudes towards the language.The experiences of many Muslim countries with colonialism, the concern about los-ing their cultural values and identity as a result of using English, the growing realiza-tion that English has been and is being taught as a missionary language (seePennycook & Coutand-Marin, 2003), the concern that English may displace Arabicor their native language, and more recently, the media wars that have erupted in theaftermath of 9/11 (see TESOL Islamia, 2004; Interview with Pennycook by

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Karmani, 2003) in which Muslims have been painted in a less-than-positive lighthave affected, in varying degrees, the attitudes of Muslims towards English. The stu-dentsapprehension about learning English as a result of some of these factors maybe interpreted by teachers to mean that they are not interested in learning the lan-guage, when, in fact they can be helped to overcome these anxieties by letting themsee that English is not a threat to their identities as Muslims. Thus, teacher educationprograms should take steps to sensitize prospective teachers of English to thesocio-cultural and socio-religious complexities that surround the teaching andlearning of English, as this would broaden their perspectives with regard to the cul-tural differences that they may encounter as language teachers.

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