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MULTICULTURALISM

Multiculturalism is a body of thought in political philosophy about the proper way to respond to cultural and religious diversity. Mere toleration of group differences is said to fall short of treating members of minority groups as equal citizens; recognition and positive accommodation of group differences are required through “group-differentiated rights,” a term coined by Will Kymlicka (1995).

Multiculturalism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

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Free Malaysia Today

1 nation, 1 language? Nonsense, says Hadi

The PAS chief calls on Malaysians to rejoice in their multiculturalism.

SEREMBAN: The idea of enforcing the use of a single language in Malaysia defies common sense, according to PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang.

Speaking at a PAS dialogue with the Malaysian Federation of Chinese Associations here yesterday, Hadi said Malaysians should be proud of the multilingual character of the nation.

“When you have so many languages, you enrich the different languages,” he said. “I believe there are certain terms in the Chinese language that you can’t find in Arabic. Then there are certain terms used in English that you can’t find in Chinese or Malay.

“This allows us to share terms between languages, resulting in the enrichment of the different languages.

“The idea of a one-nation-one-language policy is nonsense.”

Hadi was responding to the chairman of the Negeri Sembilan Chinese Assembly Hall, Lau Chee Boon, who asked him to state PAS’ stand on such a policy, which has been proposed by various politicians through the years.

Among the other groups represented at the dialogue was Dong Zong, the United Chinese School Committees Association of Malaysia.

1 nation, 1 language? Nonsense, says Hadi

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