At first glance, Indonesian and Malay have almost the same language. But actually, of course different. Malay is an Austronesian language spoken in the archipelago and the Malacca Peninsula. So what are the differences between Indonesia vs Malay? Check out the reviews of the following.
Mention of Indonesian, Not Malay
Indonesian itself is said to be derived from the Malay language. Indonesian itself then agreed to be called Indonesian, not Malay. For the Indonesian people, this language is the language of struggle declared in the Youth Pledge of October 28, 1928 where the unitary language of the Republic of Indonesia is called by the name Indonesian.
Malay has the status of a regional language in Indonesia.
When compared to Malay, Indonesian has a higher status. This matter because in Indonesia itself, Malay has the status as a regional language, while the Malay language in Indonesia has the status as a national language.
The status of the Malay language in Indonesia is no different from other regional languages such as Sundanese, Batak, Javanese, Papuan, and others. That’s why so as not to get mixed up in the mention, then the names of Indonesian and Malay are applied.
Develop in a different way.
How the Indonesian language develops differs from the Malay language in Indonesia. The development and enrichment of Indonesian vocabulary itself are influenced by various foreigners such as Dutch, Arabic, Portuguese, English, Chinese, and many more.
Similar to Indonesian, Malay is also influenced by various languages from other regions and the Indonesian language itself. This is because Indonesian is the national language of the country, so it is spoken by many people.
Many regional languages then absorb terms from Indonesian, including the Indonesian language Malay, for example, in the Riau Archipelago, where people absorb a lot of language vocabulary from Indonesia.
The number of Indonesian speakers is much larger.
As it is known that the number of Indonesian speakers is much larger compared to Malay. This is because the population is around 279 million souls. These speakers include elementary and kindergarten students and parents from cities and rural towns.
The number of Indonesian speakers above has yet to be added to around 80,000 language learners Indonesian foreign. They learn from Language Agency facilities in more than 40 countries. Besides that, some speakers learn Indonesian by themselves from the local community.
Although it is not facilitated in Japan, Indonesian people introduce the Indonesian language against the Japanese. The same thing is done in Australia, especially at the school age base. From the results of discussions by members of the Perth Language Center, there are at least 40,000 speakers.
The level of understanding of Indonesian is much higher.
When compared to Malay, the level of understanding or mutual intelligence of the language Indonesia is more comprehensive and taller. When the Malays hear the narrative, their Indonesian language will be easily understood. As for the Malay language speaking, there is no. Of course, Indonesian speakers will understand.
With these conditions, it is very reasonable if the Indonesian language shows coverage and higher understanding. That’s why it’s easier to learn, especially for language learner.
The difference between Indonesian and Malay above shows that Indonesian as a mother tongue still has a higher existence. Even though historically, it came from Malay, but Indonesian remains the national and unified language.
