Kodrah Kristang: The initiative to revitalize the Kristang language in Singapore

Kristang is the critically endangered heritage language of the Portuguese-Eurasian community in Singapore and the wider Malayan region, and is spoken by an estimated less than 100 fluent speakers in Singapore. In Singapore, especially, up to 2015, there was almost no known documentation of Kristang, and a declining awareness of its existence, even among the Portuguese-Eurasian community. However, efforts to revitalize Kristang in Singapore under the auspices of the community-based non-profit, multiracial and intergenerational Kodrah Kristang ('Awaken, Kristang') initiative since March 2016 appear to have successfully reinvigorated community and public interest in the language; more than 400 individuals, including heritage speakers, children and many people outside the Portuguese-Eurasian community, have joined ongoing free Kodrah Kristang classes, while another 1,400 participated in the inaugural Kristang Language Festival in May 2017, including Singapore's Deputy Prime Minister and the Portuguese Ambassador to Singapore. Unique features of the initiative include the initiative and its associated Portuguese-Eurasian community being situated in the highly urbanized setting of Singapore, a relatively low reliance on financial support, visible, if cautious positive interest from the Singapore state, a multiracial orientation and set of aims that embrace and move beyond the language's original community of mainly Portuguese-Eurasian speakers, and, by design, a multiracial youth-led core team. This article documents the Kodrah Kristang initiative from its inception in March 2016 to July 2018. After a consideration of my perspective as Kodrah Kristang founder and director and a review of the literature, I outline Singapore's sociolinguistic situation and a first attempt at a history of Kristang in Singapore, then continue on into the Kodrah Kristang initiative proper, describing the evolution of the initiative from pilot classes in March 2016 to its present state and outlining the Kaminyu di Kodramintu (Revitalization Plan) that guides the community. I then discuss key features of the initiative, and close with a discussion of the long-term challenges that face Kodrah as it enters Phase 3 of the revitalization effort.