Title: Singlish in cyberspace: Effects of the Speak Good English Movement (SGEM) campaign Authors: Huey, C. H. & Anthony, L. Keywords: Singlish, creole language, sociolinguistics, language policy, national identity, language change, online communication Abstract: Singlish is a creole language that combines English with other languages and dialects in Singapore. Due to its potential implications on successful communication in international settings, Singlish has often been deemed controversial, leading to various initiatives to restrict its usage. One such example is the Speak Good English Movement (SGEM), a nation-wide campaign initiated in 2000 by the Singaporean government to promote the use of Standard English among Singaporeans. While some groups have reacted to the campaign positively, critics have long argued that it advocates an elitist form of language that has led to the devaluation of Singlish. Despite these criticisms, the SGEM was recently relaunch in 2019, after close to a decade of inactivity. This paper aims to investigate the campaign’s effect on the Singaporean creole language as it is used in cyberspace. The study focuses on the usage of Singlish sentence-final discourse particles, a linguistic feature often described as the most salient feature of Singlish. Reddit comments from the r/Singapore subreddit were collected from 2018 to 2022 using the Python Reddit API Wrapper. Next, changes in the usage of such discourse particles were investigated using statistical and qualitative corpus methods. Results reveal that the use of Singlish in online discourse varies considerably depending on the individual, but it has remained relatively stable over the period of study despite the relaunch of the SGEM campaign. The study therefore argues that Singlish usage in online spaces reflects a divergent relationship between the Singaporean government’s language policies and the language practices of Singaporeans. We anticipate that these findings can contribute to the current literature on Singlish usage and provide valuable insights for language policy makers and educators. The study also demonstrates the potential of corpus linguistic analysis in understanding the use of English in transnational contexts, specifically in the online space. APA Citation: Huey, C. H. & Anthony, L. (2023, May 20). Singlish in cyberspace: Effects of the Speak Good English Movement (SGEM) campaign [Conference presentation]. ICAME 44, NWU Vanderbijlpark, South Africa. https://osf.io/6tcnj