Social history group assignment complete (updated)

SSF 1103: MALAYSIAN SOCIAL HISTORY

FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE AND HUMANITIES
PROGRAMME: INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND

LABOUR STUDIES (UW6347001)
LECTURER : AWANG MASHABI

Name Matrix number
BRANDON BONNEY JEFFERINUS 78980
IMMANUEL ISAAC ANAK MARC JACKSON 79569
DESMOND FAM YUEN KAIN 79213
DESY TIFFANY ANAK KENNEDY 79216
MICHELLE MONIQUE ANAK ELEXANDER 80046
NELSON TING WEE HOCK 82284
MARYLINE SUZIE ANAK SINTAU 79989
81061
ROSMANIRA BINTI JUHAR

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TABLE OF CONTENTS: Page
number
No Contents
3-5
LU1 Introduction - What is History?
LU2 The Uses of History 6-8
LU8 Orang Asli and Orang Asal
LU11 Education and the Schooling System 9-12

13-15

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Learning Unit 1:
Introduction-What is History?

Concept 1: History vs Historiography Key terms: Ancient, sense, study, past, develop,
HISTORY: understanding, based, term, importance, biases, alter

The word history comes from the Ancient Greek word historía,
meaning "inquiry", "knowledge from inquiry", or "judge". It was
in that sense that Aristotle used the word in his History of
Animals.

History means the study of or a record of
past events considered together, especially events of
a particular period, country, or subject (Cambridge
Dictionary, 2021)

Why we should study history?

Studying history enables us to develop better understanding of the world in which we live. Building
knowledge and understanding of historical events and trends, especially over the past century, enables us to
develop a much greater appreciation for current events today (Stearns, 1998).

HISTORIOGRAPHY:

Historiography is the writing of history, especially the writing of history
based on the critical examination of sources, the selection of particular
details from the authentic materials in those sources, and the synthesis
of those details into a narrative that stands the test of critical
examination (Historiography, n.d.). The term historiography also refers
to the theory and history of historical writing.

Writing but with perspective/a view/an opinion/an interpretation.

Importance of Historiography:

1. It helps us understand why historical events
have been interpreted so differently over
time.

2. It helps us understand what biases may have
shaped the historical period.

3. It helps generalists and specialists alike.

4. It gives us an appreciation of how factors that
shape and alter the recording of history shape
and alter our interpretation of it as a result.

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Concept 2: History and Evidence Key terms: evidence, study, explain, types, branch,
focuses, different, helps

Evidence is required to write and study history. Without
evidence, one cannot explain and prove the authenticity of the
history studied.

No evidence does not mean it never existed or never happened
BUT we cannot record or study it! So effectively, non-existent!

Types of Evidence

Written words Buried
settlements
Oral stories
Cave art

Bones Artifacts

What is social history?
• Social history is a branch of history that focuses on social structures and interactions

between different groups in society rather than governmental concerns (Social History
| Branch of History, n.d.)
• Social history touches on, and maybe helps to concentrate, significant public
discussion themes (Samuel, 1985)

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Concept 3: Types of History: Dominant Key terms: nationalism, focused, motivated, nationalist,
objectives, response, organizations, goals, proposed,
citizenship, foreign, withdraw, resulting

Nationalist History

• Malay nationalism (Semangat Kebangsaan Melayu) refers to
the nationalism that focused overwhelmingly on the Malay
anticolonial struggle, motivated by the nationalist ideal of
creating a Malay nation (Bangsa Melayu) with its central
objectives were the advancement and protection of what
constitutes the Malayness – religion (Islam), language (Malay),
and royalty (Malay rulers). Such pre-occupation is a direct
response to the European colonial presence and the influx of
foreign migrant population in Malaya since the mid-nineteenth
century.

Reinforces stereotypes and dominant political narratives

• They formed voluntary organizations known as Malay
Associations in various parts of the country and their primary
goals were to advance the interests of Malays as well as
requesting British protection on Malay positions. In March
1946, 41 if these Malay Associations formed United Malays
National Organization (UMNO), to assert Malay dominance
over Malaya.

• The first major show of force by Malay nationalism came in
1946 when British proposed a Malayan Union that would
greatly reduce the powers of Malaya rulers and give
citizenship to foreign immigrants. Under intense pressure
form the United Malays National Organization, the British
withdraw the proposal, resulting the formation of Persekutuan
Tanah Melayu in 1948.

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Learning Unit 2:
The Uses Of History

Concept 1: Key Terms: illustrations, humanity’s, cultivated, past, heritage, identity, behave,
critical, analytical, important, source, information, considerations,
prepared, associated.

According to Wang Gungwu (1968), the use of history is that it
helps us to get data and illustrations about the what happens in
the past. He said that history also imparts us the meaning of life
and death which are the means of understanding humanity’s
place on earth and what their vocation is. History cultivated us
about the past societies, systems, ideologies, governments, etc.

According to Yong Mun Cheong (2000), history helps us to get
better understanding the world today that are still bounded with the
past such as current beliefs, practices, knowledge, and the way of
life. Yong said that history also helps us to learn about our ancestral
heritage which leads to the basis of our personal identity. Yong also
stated that history helps us to understand how people behave to
different cultures, places and time. In addition, Yong assume that
history helps us to practice critical and analytic thinking skills in
answering questions about the history.

History is important to us whereby it is the source of information
for us to increase our considerations about what occasion had
ensued in the past times. It teaches us to become more rounded
people who are better prepared to learn in all academic subjects
that are associated to history.

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Concept 2 Key Terms : Evidences, Perspective, Interpretation, Importance

Perspective is the ‘point of view’ from which the creator
of a source described historical events. Every person sees
and understands events differently depending on their age,
gender, social position, beliefs and values. Even modern
historians have their own perspective which can influence

how they interpret the past.

For example:
Two groups of fans at a football match will see the same game differently. Fans of the winning side will have
a positive view and will usually talk about how great their team's actions were. The fans of the losing side will
be quite negative and may blame the result on referees or 'cheating' by the opposing team. How can two
groups see the same event differently? The answer is 'perspective': they had a different point of view.

The Importance of Perspective

Role of History (A): To tell Role of History (B): To tell
the past as it really was; to be the everyday story of ordinary
a ‘neutral’ arbiter of the ‘facts’
(esp. Politics, diplomacy and people, events and things,
economic history, history of
war but within national human attitudes, and history
boundaries!)- Ranke School that went beyond national
boundaries- Annales School.

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Concept 3 Key Terms: Bias, One -sided, True, Distorted, False

Bias means having an unfair or unbalanced opinion.

(True/Distorted/False)

If you're biased toward something, then you lean
favorably toward it; you tend to think positively of
it. Meanwhile, if you're biased against something,

then you lean negatively against it; you tend to
think poorly of it.

This is a page taken from a book History as bias/one-sided
commonly known as Foxe's Book of Male dominated
Martyrs. The book tells the story of the
persecution of Protestants in England and Old focus vs. young
was first published shortly after Queen Powerful vs. weak
Mary's death. If this was the only source Winners vs. ‘Losers’
we had and we knew nothing else about Articulate vs. silent
that period of history we would end up Hate vs. love/War vs. Peace
with a very one-sided view as this book is Terrorist or Freedom Fighter
very anti-Catholic. However, because we
have other sources and we know a lot
about Tudor history we can recognise that

this source is biased.

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Learning Unit 8:
Orang Asli and Orang Asal

Concept 1 : Key terms : Orang Asli, Negrito, Abioriginal, Senoi, heterogeneous,
sedentary, accesible, population, Orang Asal

Orang Asli is a heterogeneous group in
Peninsular Malaysia. They are widely
dispersed in all states. Today, the Orang
Asli’s population numbers about 150, 000.
It’s representing 0.5 percent of the
national population,

There are a few subgroups in Orang Asli. The most popular subgroup is
known as The Senoi, The Negrito, and The Aboriginal. Senoi and Negrito
are the Northern Orang Asli group. Meanwhile, Aboriginal is the
Southern Orang Asli group. Therefore, they have a different linguistic
each group.

The Orang Asli or known as “Original Peoples” are the descendants of the
earliest known inhabitants of the Malays Peninsula (arriving as early as
25, 000 years ago).

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Concept 2 :

Key terms: World War II, Slaves, colonial, laborers, governance, Chinese, communities,
commodities.

Before World War II, Proto-Malays had close contact
with the Malays for hundreds of years. Many of them
have converted to Islam. The evidence of Negrito and
Senoi having contact with other communities is they
obtained commodities (etc; salt, jungle knives & metal
axe).

They also play an important role in trade and governance in the region and alliances. According to
Andaya (2008), during this period up through the early 20th
century, the Malays depended on the Orang Asli as their
primary source of forest products.
Long history in South East Asia, many people become slavery.
It’s has been widespread in the Malay States since the 19th
century. There are two types of main slaves which are ordinary
and debtor slaves.

The Chinese community in the Malay States had much less
contact with the Orang Asli than did the Malays. This was due
to the concentration of Chinese in urban centers and tin-
mining districts. Several Chinese men married into Orang Asli
communities learned their language and lives with the tribes

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Concept 3:

Key terms: The Emergency, counter-insurgency, communist revolt, intimidation, indoctrination,
position, violence, welfare, jurisdiction, strategy, advisory role, provision, protection, isolation.
• The Malayan Emergency (1948-1960) was one of the successful counter-insurgency operations

undertaken by the Western powers during the Cold War. This conflict happened in June 1948
following the murder of three Western planters near Perak, which was fought between British
colonial and Commonwealth forces and members of the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) and the
Malayan National Liberation Army (MNLA).

• MCP faced the struggle with confidence based upon the support which they had organized, during
The Occupation among rural Chinese communities. They depended on the Orang Asli to provide
them with food, and sometimes shelter, and information about the Security Forces. The communist
tried to win over the Orang Asli by making the promises that they will have a better position as the
first people of the land once the British were defeated. Nevertheless, the Orang Asli not only wooed
but also being threatened and faced a great deal of violence during this period. Under the British
Administration, the welfare of the Orang Asli came under the jurisdiction of the Department of
Social Welfare from 1947 to 1949. The success of resettling the Chinese caused the powers to
believe that much of the same strategy could be used with the Orang Asli to refuse their support to
the Communists.

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• In early 1953, The Department of Aborigines was still very small and its function was limited to an
advisory role. The great degree of expansion had happened by the end of 1954. The Department
had become responsible to provide education, welfare, and medical facilities for Orang Asli areas.
The Aboriginal Peoples Ordinance 1954 covered the whole of the Federation of Malaya. It
introduced several provisions for the protection of the Orang Asli. There were 529 Orang Asli
attending schools in Forts and outside of the jungle by the end of 1955. After centuries of relative
isolation, they experienced considerable and often savage contact with battling factions of
outsiders. The Government that before this mistreated and neglected them, now took an active and
wide interest in Orang Asli’s welfare and development.

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Learning Unit 11:
Education and the Schooling System

Concept 1

Keywords: Malaysian Education Systems, Education
Reforms and Talent Development

The Malaysian education WHAT IS
systems have a long history EDUCATION ?
before the Pre-World War II
since 1824 to 1957, and it Education is both
continued to reform from the act of teaching
1957 to 2020.
knowledge to
others and the act

of receiving
knowledge from
someone else.
Education also refers
to the knowledge
received through

schooling or
instruction and to the
institution of teaching

as a whole.

Malaysian Education Systems have reformed since 1824. The paper begins by summarizing
various literatures that pointed before Pre – British Period, 1824. Then, it discusses from 1824 to
1941 Pre – World War II, and followed by The Pre – Independence -1941 – 1957, The Post –
Independence – 1957 onwards and, finally reviewing the Malaysian Education Blueprint 2013-2025.
This history was prepared to be a guide for future researchers to capture literatures on the
Malaysian Education Systems since 1824.

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Keywords : Background study, Divide and Rule Policy, Concept 2
ethnicty, religion and race

The Malaysian Education System has undergone various reforms since 1824 and during the British

Colonialism, the schooling systems begin to be structured. Malaysia was known as Malaya and four
streams of education medium were established based on “Divide and Rule Policy” such as English

Medium, Malay Medium, Tamil Medium and Chinese Medium.

The “Divide and Rule Policy” allowed the British to separate the public by ethnicity, religion, race
besides dividing them as upper class and lower class to government. Figure 1 was develop by the author
to provide a holistic view of the reforms in Malaysia to present :
Figure 1

HOLISTIC VIEW OF
HISTORY OF MALAYSIAN

EDUCATIONS
SYSTEMS

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Concept 3

Keywords : Literature review, teaching, softskills, survior skills and medium
school

SEKOLAH PONDOK PAK YA

⚫ In 1824, the education was generally delivered in a non-formal pedagogy where it was emphasized
on religious teaching, value and morality teaching, spiritual teaching, martial arts teaching and
handicraft teaching. In addition, education is taught for as a survival related to teaching on
agriculture, fishing and hunting . Furthermore, during that era, there was this system known for
religious education as “pondok” (small hut) as a school established by Islamic religious scholars .

⚫ This type of school begin in 1450 in State of Malacca (Melaka), and only during the 19th century it
expended in other states like Kelantan, Terengganu and Kedah.

⚫ By 1918, most of the students will stay around this this school by having their own small huts built
around it and economic development also emerged. Today, there is some school still existed and it
is managed in more organised matter. To think about it, today in the 21st century Malaysia is
refocusing its education system on various soft kills, and survivor skills.

⚫ During the period of 1824 to 1941, the education administrations in the Malay Peninsula were
very much based on the colonial policy of “Divide and Rule Policy”. Four language concept of
education was (Malay, Chinese, Tamil and English) and it was separated with school systems to
serve different purposes. It has to note at this stage, during the war, many were affected and the
counselling concepts started to develop in the US.
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⚫ The Malay education actually started during the “pondok school” concept and had strong Quranic
teaching. In 1858, most of the Malay schools was expended and taken over by the British Malaya
administration and financial aid was provided. These schools were assisted by the British East India
Company and by 1938, approximately 788 Malay school was subsidized in the Straits of Malacca
(Melaka) and the Federated Malay States.

⚫ The main purpose of the Malay education is to provide knowledge on reading writing and
arithmetic (Mathematics) together with vocational skills to enable more students to become better
farmer and fishermen.

⚫ Today, in 2020 we are discussing similar issues under the name TVET. Education was given more
focus by the citizen and administration and in 1884 the Training of Malay Teachers was started in
Telok Belanga, Singapore, which was part of the Malaya Federation. Due to the increase in demand,
in 1922 The Sultan Indris Training College in Tanjung Malim was established which known today
as the University Pendidikan Sultan Indris (UPSI). Furthermore 1935, The Malay Women’s
Training College was established to train Malay women teachers.

CHINESE MEDIUM SCHOOL

CHINESE SCHOOL AT ⚫ In 1829, the Chinese education in Malaya was very
YEAR 1950 much driven and influenced by the political
development in China and it began in Singapore. The
curriculum was based on China and teaching
materials and teachers were brought in from China
and were fully maintained by the Chinese
community.

⚫ In 1920, the British administration introduced the law
to prevent alienation and to have a control of the
activities of these schools to avoid any communism
activities.

⚫ Since 1924, some of the school begun to get financial
grants by the British government and, by 1938, 654
Chinese schools was established. (305 Schools
assisted by government, 18 managed by Christian
missionaries, 331 by private Chinese organisations
and only after the World War II, it had formal teacher
training programmes.

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TAMIL MEDIUM SCHOOL TAMIL SCHOOL AT
YEAR 1950
⚫ In 1816, the first Tamil primary school
started in Penang for Indians who came ENGLISH MEDIUM SCHOOL
to Malaya as traders and migrant
workers in rubber, tea, coffee and sugar ⚫ The English education was established
plantations. This plantation eventually in 1816 as Penang Free School and by
grew and some was owned by wealthy 1938, 56 government schools, 59
Indian traders and in 1923. supported schools, and 106 private
English schools were established in
⚫ The Federated Malay States Ordinance Malaya.
incorporated a provision to the
plantation owners to build schools for ⚫ The curriculum was based by the Great
their employees children. In 1905, there Britain, and in 1905 the Malay College
was 13 government schools, 23 at Kuala Kangsar, Perak was
Christian missionary Tamil schools, 551 established to train administrators for
estate schools and 60 private Tamil the Malayan Civil service.
schools were established throughout
Peninsular or Malaya . ⚫ Most of them are from aristocratic
families (Royal Family/ upper social
⚫ The curriculum was based on India classes). Furthermore, in 1905 - 1912,
education systems and most teachers diploma level courses were established
were from India. The teacher training at Raffles College in Singapore, Higher
programme started before the World Education course in science and arts at
War II. Emphasis was given on reading, King Edward VII Medical College
writing and arithmetic (Mathematics).

ENGLISH SCHOOL AT
YEAR 1950

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